A little favor and a lot of hard work: Wasco PD nears start-up

A little over a year ago, the City of Wasco started its process of rebuilding the city’s police department. Now after 13 months of work, the city has the staffing, equipment, and vehicles in place, but the only thing they’re missing is their 9-1-1 call center.
When speaking with 23ABC, Wasco Police Chief Charlie Fivecoat said he started making notes about what a department starting from the ground up would need to get started. He joked about the irony of the first note he wrote down, which was to start the process of setting up the call center, is now the final thing the department needs to start sending officers out on the street.
Wasco City Manager Scott Hurlbert said at the start of rebuilding the department, he and Chief Fivecoat believed that finding staff for the department would be the most difficult part of the process, but he said they’re both thankful that’s not the case. The biggest challenge at this point, according to Hurlbert, is getting the equipment for the call center to work in tandem with various systems the department will use in their day-to-day work.
Chief Fivecoat told 23ABC he’s hopeful the equipment will be operational in February, so the department can start training on it and be ready to start putting officers on the street by the middle of March.