PURCELLVILLE, Va. January 10, 2020 — The Town of Purcellville is pleased to announce that the Purcellville Police Department’s Byrne Justice Assistance Grant application seeking funds in the amount of $23,801 to purchase four Mobile Data Terminals (MDTs) and an Electronic Summons System (eCitation) has been recently awarded. The project is supported by the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services through the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance’s Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grants (JAG). The grants are awarded on a competitive basis to facilitate the prevention and control of crime, and improve law enforcement functionality.
The Purcellville Police Department will utilize the grant monies to fund the hardware, software, and equipment for the implementation and maintenance of an eCitation program. The funds will include purchasing the eCitation software program, seven handheld Enterprise Visibility Mobility (EVM) units and corresponding in-car summons printers. The EVMs will be used by officers to issue summonses and collect and transmit the data electronically. It is estimated that sixty percent of law enforcement agencies have adopted some form of eCitation. Some of the benefits by initiating eCitation include increased overall efficiency, improved officer safety and summons accuracy, increased both citizen and officer satisfaction, and increased system productivity. The ability to electronically complete and submit summonses greatly decreases the time it takes for officers to write a summons, therefore reducing the time occupied by both the motorist and officer during a traffic stop. Having eCitation substantially decreases the cost and processing time for both the police department and the court system by reducing staff hours expended on summons collection and reporting, as well as reducing possible handwritten and/or data entry errors.
The remaining JAG funds will be used to purchase four new Mobile Data Terminals (MDTs), which are ruggedized notebook computers used in patrol vehicles to facilitate field reporting. The MDTs allow officers to generate and file incident, accident, and other reports directly at the scene of an incident from their patrol vehicles through the use of a secure, remote computer interface system. The four units purchased will complement the ten MDTs funded by last year’s Byrne Justice Grant award and four purchased from local funds. The awarding of these grant funds will complete the department’s goal of each officer having an assigned MDT, and allowing for the replacement of obsolete MDTs in service.
“Being that we are a smaller agency, the funding of the Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant makes a tremendous difference in our ability to improve our technology, and therefore efficiency. The less time our officers spend on writing reports and summonses, the more time they have to actively patrol and interact with our community members, which is what both the public and our officers prefer. We are very grateful to receive this funding and the impact will be significant for not only our officers, but more importantly for the community we serve.” said Chief Cynthia McAlister.
