ORLANDO, Fla. - The Orlando Police Department will soon have 800 new rifles to replace the 500 AR-15 style rifles currently carried by uniformed officers.

Last month, the Orlando City Council approved the purchase of 800 new Sig Sauer rifles for the police department.

"Sometimes people basically arm themselves with weapons that are more powerful than a regular handgun," Orlando Police Chief Orlando Rolon said.

On Monday, the city council approved funding for training needed for the new firearms and the purchase of optics equipment necessary for the new weapons.

"It’s really a huge upgrade to what we have now, and it improves the accuracy when you fire the weapon tremendously," Rolon said.

The upgraded weapons, including optics and lights, will cost an estimated $1.34 million, according to OPD spokesman Eduardo Bernal.

The new Sig Sauer guns will replace approximately 500 Bushmaster rifles currently used by uniformed officers. About 300 of the new rifles will go to nonuniformed officers, including detectives, watch commanders and sergeants. Each rifle will be custom to the officer.

Bernal said the intent behind purchasing the new rifles is twofold.

Bernal said the new firearms will allow managers and detectives to have a "more efficient and expeditious response" to calls when they are out of the office. He also feels confident the rifles will help the department keep the community safe.

"We always look to better our capabilities and upgrade when appropriate," Bernal said. "We strive to provide our residents and visitors with a safe environment, and one way we do that is by providing our officers with equipment that will help them succeed."

The department is aiming to deploy the new firearms in February. Each officer will go through a two-day training before acquiring a new weapon.

Orlando police officials said the plan to equip more officers with rifles has been in the works since before the Pulse nightclub shooting.

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quote:

Originally posted by bigredfish:

"It’s really a huge upgrade to what we have now, and it improves the accuracy when you fire the weapon tremendously ," Rolon said.

quote:

"Sometimes people basically arm themselves with weapons that are more powerful than a regular handgun," Orlando Police Chief Orlando Rolon said.

They either mis-quoted this guy, or ............ something.

So if the perp had a rifle, then in response, they pull out their rifle?

Um, ok.

What happens to the 500 AR 15's? Hope they don't get destroyed.

Well, which Sig rifle did they select - 516, M400, or MCX?

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Originally posted by bigredfish:

"It’s really a huge upgrade to what we have now, and it improves the accuracy when you fire the weapon tremendously ," Rolon said.

I think he was referring to the optics.

How often were the 500 Bushmasters used??? I would bet they generally have less than 1,000 rounds through them.

Maybe I'm not a big enough snob, but what the hell can a Sig AR do that a Bushmaster can't do? These nitwits would be better served, and money ahead, by increasing and improving their training. OPD rank and file, including those detectives and supervisors noted in the article, don't train nearly enough to be efficient with the weapons they have now. And that's not my opinion, that's the opinions of two of the OPD SWAT team members I interact with occasionally. And "custom to each officer"? What the hell is up with that?

The difference? they can say "we don't use AR-15s and neither should you".

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
And "custom to each officer"? What the hell is up with that?

That line has me leaning towards Sig’s new M400 Tread. They’re marketing a bunch of Tread accessories that all work with it and using buzz words like ecosystem to describe it

quote:

Maybe I'm not a big enough snob, but what the hell can a Sig AR do that a Bushmaster can't do?

Nothing...what they should be doing is ADDING the 800 MORE rifles to their inventory and deploy them to all of their officers


and add more training, and more shooting time, and some more training and shooting...their ammo budget should be tripled and maybe quintupled..

bet no one had looked at that, have they? adding more training time and training ammo budget...nope-not a one-except the trainers, who no one listens to anyway...

When you put a purchase like this in the budget you have to dumb down the justification to give elected officials a better chance to understand it. Even so some commissioner will probably object on "principle". I think there is a lot of federal grant money out there as well.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:

quote:

Maybe I'm not a big enough snob, but what the hell can a Sig AR do that a Bushmaster can't do?

Nothing...what they should be doing is ADDING the 800 MORE rifles to their inventory and deploy them to all of their officers


and add more training, and more shooting time, and some more training and shooting...their ammo budget should be tripled and maybe quintupled..

bet no one had looked at that, have they? adding more training time and training ammo budget...nope-not a one-except the trainers, who no one listens to anyway...

Precision accuracy is an obsession for law enforcement with police rifles, due to the nature of active shooter situations and the risk for collateral injury to innocents. The impetus for rifles replacing shotguns in patrol cars.

I have been to several police rifle instructor courses in the past several years. Rarely do I see a police rifle any more that does not have at least one optic on board. Sig is marketing a full package rifle and optics that would be compelling. I also own Bushmaster and a Sig 516 Carbon. The Bushmaster is a good entry level rifle but doesn't hold a candle to my Sig for precision.

The "optics" suck, and you will undoubtedly here an loud wail from the LGBTQRSTEIEOEO community since the Orlando mass murderer used a MCX in 5.56x45.

quote:

That line has me leaning towards Sig’s new M400 Tread

I could see why a bureaucracy finds using a single vendor for all accessories, etc appealing.

quote:

Originally posted by HayesGreener:

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:

quote:

Maybe I'm not a big enough snob, but what the hell can a Sig AR do that a Bushmaster can't do?

Nothing...what they should be doing is ADDING the 800 MORE rifles to their inventory and deploy them to all of their officers


and add more training, and more shooting time, and some more training and shooting...their ammo budget should be tripled and maybe quintupled..

bet no one had looked at that, have they? adding more training time and training ammo budget...nope-not a one-except the trainers, who no one listens to anyway...

Precision accuracy is an obsession for law enforcement with police rifles, due to the nature of active shooter situations and the risk for collateral injury to innocents. The impetus for rifles replacing shotguns in patrol cars.

I have been to several police rifle instructor courses in the past several years. Rarely do I see a police rifle any more that does not have at least one optic on board. Sig is marketing a full package rifle and optics that would be compelling. I also own Bushmaster and a Sig 516 Carbon. The Bushmaster is a good entry level rifle but doesn't hold a candle to my Sig for precision.

Please don't take this out of context, but acute accuracy is not even in the realm of reality for a majority of the local officers I've shot with and/or against at the range. They don't train or shoot enough to even begin to scratch the surface of being highly proficient with their AR's let alone their handguns. And quite frankly, a lot of these guys don't have a hard on for guns in the first place. My old eyes and body sporting my accessorized/modified Rock River LAR-15 have time and again beaten patrol officers and their supervisors during range days (can't whip the SWAT guys though, dammit!). I'm not beating these guys because I have better hardware, I'm beating them because I've put 50x the amount of rounds down range, and have participated in more personal training than most of these guys will in their entire careers.

This expenditure by OPD is nothing more than a 'keeping up with the Jones' attempt, paid for once again by the local taxpayers. The officers as a whole who receive these SIG guns will be no better off when the SHTF than they were with the Bushmasters.

More of our tax money down the drain.

The replies in this thread amuse me.

I see no information in the article about how old the Bushmasters are or how they're equipped. LE guns are generally not shot a ton, but my department is probably averaging about 1000 rounds per year, per rifle. A little more for tac team guys, a little less for non-tac team guys. We went through and replaced all of the magazines last year when we started having double feed issues. The mags were 10+ years old and USGI style. Now, I know all of the naysayers have GI mags their uncle brought back from Vietnam with blood on them that still work, but this was our experience.

There is also the man hours cost of upgrading current guns. How long does it take you to remove the optic and light from your gun, install new ones, and find a way to sell the old ones? Multiply that times 500. I have boxes of outdated junk in my armory at work that I can't throw away, but they won't let me sell.

Looking at the UCR's police employee tables tells me that the 800 rifles is enough to issue one to every officer. Issuing rifles to just patrol officers is short sighted when you consider that the department has dozens, or even hundreds of officers in investigative, administrative, or specialty roles who can have these guns in their vehicles when out in the community. It also prevents delays in equipping officers transferring back to patrol assignments and getting rifles from officers transferring out.

Then you have the problem in a large agency of having a variety of stuff out there. Say they just buy enough rifles to outfit the balance of the officers. Now you've got at least two configurations of the rifle out there as they will most likely have different lights, optics, slings, sights, etc. Now that's no big deal to the guys on this forum, but a good percentage of end users aren't going to be "gun people", so consistency aids training.

On that same topic, the rifle is a force multiplier. It increases range, lethality, and accuracy. It's easier to shoot and ballistically superior than a handgun. When you're talking about a gun meant to engage a gunman in a crowded area and considering the average firearms competency of a police officer, you want them carrying a rifle.

The odds are that Sig and/or a dealer facilitating this deal offered trade value on the existing guns and good pricing on the new ones to get this deal and the press that goes with it.

Or maybe they're wasting money on unnecessary toys.

^^^^^ yep.

I was going to end with "I'm sure jljones will be along shortly with a +1"