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Originally posted by chongosuerte:

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Originally posted by CPD SIG:

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Originally posted by chongosuerte:
For 8 Gs I'd figure out or find a system to keep my damn vest cool. Last summer I had heat rash so bad I was bleeding at the end of shifts.

Chongo, do you have to wear the vest under your uniform shirt, or can you wear it in a vest-cover?

We still wear concealable armor. They have been testing outer carriers for a couple of years now, but they haven't started issuing them.

When you go to an outside carrier it will feel like you died and went to heaven. I tried wearing my armour under the shirt years ago and never could. As a result I never wore it.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:
So remember, no matter how much more comfortable, safe, better, smoother, easier, etc. something makes your job-there is a guy in an office who hasn't worked the street in 20 years making the decisions....

Indeed.

We tried to get outer carriers several years ago. Bosses didn't like the way they looked. "Too intimidating". Luckily, they backed off that in the last couple years, with Safariland's latest generation of neutral-looking slick-sided carriers. We got a few last year to demo, and went all-in for outer carriers starting this year. Thankfully, my vest was up for replacement this year, so I'm in the first round of new outer vest purchases.

They won't help with getting the weight up off our belts, thanks to the slick carriers, but at least they'll be a bit more comfortable than our concealable vests.


As for the jackets-by-committee, I feel your pain there too. We got all new coats a few years ago. They were super thin, and had no hood. Awful choice for cold/wet days. And on the occasional really stupidly freezing cold days around here, I absolutely froze my ass off.

I ended up buying my own coat to the tune of $200ish, but it's warmer and has a hood and zip-in liner. Money well spent.


Good to know I'm not the only one dealing with shit like this. Sounds like it's pretty universal.

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Originally posted by Bulldog7972:

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Originally posted by chongosuerte:

quote:

Originally posted by CPD SIG:

quote:

Originally posted by chongosuerte:
For 8 Gs I'd figure out or find a system to keep my damn vest cool. Last summer I had heat rash so bad I was bleeding at the end of shifts.

Chongo, do you have to wear the vest under your uniform shirt, or can you wear it in a vest-cover?

We still wear concealable armor. They have been testing outer carriers for a couple of years now, but they haven't started issuing them.

When you go to an outside carrier it will feel like you died and went to heaven. I tried wearing my armour under the shirt years ago and never could. As a result I never wore it.

AMEN to that! Chongo, they make vest covers in black, as well as various colors that will match your uniform shirt. ESPECIALLY for you guys down south! SSSOOOOOOO MUCH MORE COMFORTABLE! Outside is a codura type material, inside is "ribbed for your pleasure"! Some air gets between you and the vest. Working pockets, a spot for your name tag & badge.
You need to sell the powers that be on this!

1. CARGO PANTS.

WE have SO MUCH crap we have to carry. So many depts, including mine ahve decided that we HAVE TO LOOK ABSOLUTELY PROFESSIONAL at all times. Add in the fact that the DOJ and the idiot ACLU fed protestors decide we can't look to scary.

Give us outside vests with pockets (they dont' have to be MOLLE, just damn pockets.

Then we can carry the following stuff:

2. Tourniquets. Not just one. We need one, possibly two for ourselves if we get hit. We should carry AT LEAST 2 of them. It does you not a damn bit of good if your tourniquet is in your car in your first aid kit. On a wound you need one for if you have to run back and forth to your car, your subject will ahve already bled out by the time you get it.

3. Quikclot or similar. For the same reasons as above

4. More comfortable/heat resistant uniforms. shorts and polo shirts when it is above 90 degrees. Then we actually WANT to be out of our cars talking to people in the neighborhoods, changing your tires on the side of the road, or out playing with neighborhood kids for those of us who actually have more than 30 seconds between calls.

5. Stuff to hand out to kids that they actually want. It is always a positive PR campaign to interact with kids and give them a small token. But the kids don't always want badge stickers, or "baseball cards" (that aren't actually baseball or whatever sport and feature a K9 or "Officer Friendly and his "stats"") Give us glow sticks in the summer for the kids at night, candy, nerf footballs, baseball gloves, or shit kids can actually use.

6. Support. Maybe if people shouted down the idiots who are the vastly vocal minority who have nothing better to do than bitch about us doing out jobs we could get the message out that the majority of the population actually needs and WANTS us to lock up idiots who can't play nice in civilized society.

But this is a pretty tall wishlist....

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I get annoyed to no end about not having a take-home car. I had one for 8 years with my old agency. For patrol here it is a crapshoot most days on which or even if they will have a car when they show up. Our leaders will dump money on every pet project imaginable, but they won't buy us all cars. Luckily the unit I'm on doesn't have the same problem...but it's still a huge issue overall.

Oh, and dont even GET ME STARTED about take home cars... and I have had a take home car since 2012...

I feel almost guilty each and every day for having one.

We get about 6 per shift, and a shift has about 22 officers.

we have about 20 working pool cars (in theory). In reality at least 5 are wrecked (cause it takes the one low bidder body shop months to fix them) and at least 5 more are down for maintenance reasons or from some disease or parasite some prisoner infected them with.

So... with 3 take homes working on any particular day, and maybe 12 to 14 pool cars in service... We find it IMPOSSIBLE to staff our usual 18 to 22 officers at a time.....

That means large sectors are left unpatrolled because two officers get to double up and ride together. And while one officers writes an accident report... the other twiddles their thumbs while calls come in... Stack that up in rush hour, the "after school heroin overdose ruse (that's actually a thing)" and the "just got off work and home from the bars domestics" we don't get much of a chance...

But more damn cars, and but better cars. And then assign them to individual officers and hold them responsible if they get fucked up...

Ugh.

KevinCW:

I have been trying for years to get my department to add trauma plate aid kit (goes under the trauma plate of your vest) to the replacement costs of ballistic vests.....no go every year.

Trauma Plate Aid Kit

Kit has 1- Hemostatic Gauze, 1- OSS Combat Compression Dressing 1- SWAT-T Tactical Wrap Tourniquet, 1- 3inch Compressed Gauze, 1- Pair of Blue nitrile gloves, 1- Tourniquet Field Application Card, all contained in our uniquely designed "skip pack".

KevinCW,

We got the OK for cargo pants about 3 years ago. A God send. The powers that be did not us to look too scary so we got the ones that are uniform type pants not 5.11 or BDU’s rather Elbeco, Flechheimer, etc...