Law enforcement dates back centuries. It’s not as if North Americans were the first to establish rules and want to keep the peace. Yet, the way policing is done has evolved dramatically. Meeting contemporary law enforcement challenges is easier with the advantages of evolving solutions – like police lockers.
Police departments face many fresh challenges, including:
- Difficulty recruiting and retaining officers
- Increasing public scrutiny
- Embracing technological change
- Balancing citizen concerns and community values with crime prevention strategies
Pandemic fatigue isn’t helping either. The Police Forum in 2021 reported an “overall 18% increase in the resignation rate in 2020-21, compared to 2019-20” and a “45% increase in the retirement rate.”
If you’re active in law enforcement, you are likely facing these issues directly. The question is: how can police lockers help? It may sound like a dubious claim, along the lines of the criminal caught red-handed and saying “it wasn’t me.” Yet, this article will explore several ways that improving storage with the right police lockers can increase process efficiency and help improve morale overall.
More storage in the same space
Many law enforcement agencies are working out of precinct offices built decades ago. At Patterson Pope, we often hear from public safety officers who feel the storage they have is “totally inadequate” for the way they work today. We are told, “We just don’t have enough space to secure all of the uniforms, vests and gear that our men and women have to wear every day.”
Departments want to get organized but believe they don’t have the space to do it. So, clutter and chaos reign. Officers have difficulty finding things they need quickly and may have to leave the precinct to answer a call wondering if their personal belongings are secure.
The good news? There are many modern locker options available to streamline the use of space and solve common challenges in public safety environments. For example:
- Personal storage lockers with bench seating make the best use of available space while keeping personal gear secure yet accessible.
- Duty lockers with double doors and pull-out drawers protect the integrity of body armor (and they can be ventilated too!).
- Police lockers can even be configured to include separately locked sections to provide additional security for personal valuables.
- Hooks in addition to hangar space provide enough space to hang multiple uniforms, duty belts and vests.
Where budget is tight but more space is a necessity, a simple retrofit could be the answer. Working with SpaceSaver police locker options, our storage experts can create new floor plans to maximize storage in your existing space.
Securing gear in gear lockers
Renovation or new construction projects provide opportunities to reconfigure storage to better suit today’s public safety needs.
When locker rooms are overcrowded or unorganized, it makes accountability more difficult. At the same time, the clutter doesn’t help officers find a sense of calm when getting ready to keep the peace.
In re-envisioning police station storage, a current trend is to provide separate spaces to store duty bags. The standard personal lockers can be constructed with benches and other features to offer personnel convenience and confidence their belongings are securely stowed. Yet the gear bag lockers might be located closer to the sally port or to where police vehicles are parked.
For instance, a suburban Chicago police department added 47 gear bag lockers to the corridor connecting its roll-call room with the parking garage. The department also added customized tactical gear storage to ensure its Tactical Intervention Unit could rapidly respond to special circumstances.
Shelves at a variety of heights accommodate helmets, weapons, radios, batteries, shields, gas masks and more. Officers can now also hang fully loaded tactical vests, each of which can weigh around 130 pounds, to get geared up faster.
Innovative solutions improve morale too
Improving access and increasing efficiency benefits the department and the community obviously. Yet it also makes life easier for the public safety officer.
Providing a clear delineation between personal space and gear storage can help with combating mental fatigue. When the locker room is designed in a smart way, the precinct gets a positive working environment. That attention to detail can pay off in improved morale, which helps engage and retain necessary law enforcement personnel.
Acknowledging that our society is increasingly digital, police lockers now even come in powered options. Take away the worry that cell phones, tablets or flash lights won’t be charged when needed. All full-height, FreeStyle personal storage lockers are designed for modular plug-and-play electrical components. Whether it’s for laptops, shavers or some other electronic device, you’ll have the ability to add power to personal lockers either now or later.
Along with electrical outlets, Spacesaver has also added USB charging options. All that without sacrificing the durability and resilience you expect from police lockers.
Police lockers make a real difference
Storage may not be top of mind when thinking about how to address challenges of modern policing. However, the right storage can help improve comfort and convenience to add accountability, expedite access and increase morale in public safety. As Sgt. David Prather of the Franklin Police in Tennessee observed after a successful installation, “We never realized how important the storage components would be and what a difference a good system makes.”
Find out how police lockers can streamline your service to the community. Patterson Pope storage experts welcome the opportunity to come in, survey your space and identify areas that can be outfitted with innovative solutions. Contact us today!
