Norcross

The Norcross Police Department (NPD) is a full-service municipal law enforcement agency that was formed in 1870. The Norcross Police Department works closely with the community to identify concerns and implement solutions relating to issues within the community. One of NPD’s biggest challenges is they don’t have a large staff of outreach officers; just one officer and that officer needs to connect with the older generation as much as the younger generation, the Latino community as much as the Korean community, and so on. The Ford Mustang Mach-E® project is just one of many ways NPD tries to connect with those they serve. It’s something that a lot of folks in Norcross think is a positive thing.

NPD is made up of 49 sworn positions, 18 of which are civilian. They cover a small 6.2-square-mile area in what (arguably) is the largest county in Georgia of over a million people. They have over 45,000 vehicles drive through the city every day and respond to over 35,000 calls for service a year. NPD is split in half—Support

Services (SS) and Uniform Patrol (UP). UP includes Patrol Shifts, Traffic Unit, and Court Security. SS oversees the rest: Dispatchers, Criminal Investigations Division (CID), Property and Evidence, Community Outreach, Crime Analysis, Professional Standards Unit (PSU)/Training/Internal Affairs (IA)/Hiring.

Under the direction of Chief Bill Grogan, the NPD is always looking for new ways to build stronger connections with the community. This is something that is often very difficult to do given today’s existing political climate. That said, Chief Grogan and his police fleet upfit provider Tracy Gooch (“Gooch”) had an idea to prototype a new style of police vehicle and use it as a community outreach vehicle. The vehicle would be assigned to a single officer working an eight-hour shift, so charging downtime would not be an issue and the vehicle would be a shared response vehicle used for community events and some limited operational policing.

To make this new vehicle something that could positively enhance community engagement with police, it would have to be something very different than the regular patrol vehicle. In addition, Chief Grogan wanted to do something a little more environmentally friendly while staying true to the mission of the department. So, the Ford Mustang Mach-E was chosen, and not just the Mach-E base model but the Premium trim level. (https://www. ford.com/police-vehicles/) As the Mach-E continues to be chosen by many law enforcement agencies, Ford has gone on record stating that the Mach-E GT is the minimum spec for any police-style upfitting equipment.

Choosing the Mach-E Premium trim level brought a whole host of new upfit challenges for Gooch and his team. For example, how exactly do you attach a regular police lightbar to a vehicle with a very curved roof mostly made of glass? Well, with help from some dedicated equipment vendors like Whelen, Gooch was able to modify the Whelen Legacy lightbar feet to facilitate mounting on the unique Mach-E roof. The lightbar wiring was underneath the feet and fed through the Mach-E body trim all the way to the rear where it entered through factory grommets. The Mach-E low-profile strap kit was then used to secure the lightbar to the roof. (https://www.whelen.com/ product/legacy/)

Once the lightbar was installed, it was apparent that light flashback was engulfing the interior of the vehicle, which was obviously unsafe, so a fix was necessary. This was resolved by installing a factory OEM Ford snap-in sunshade and headliner. This completely blocked the lightbar flashback while maintaining a clean factory interior look.

Chief Grogan’s direction to Gooch was

Looking the part.

simple: Make the build as close to a regular patrol vehicle as you can but also make it standout and take advantage of some of the vehicle’s uniqueness. Gooch complied with the chief’s direction by installing the same Setina push bar, dual Whelen® 100-watt siren speakers, same Whelen “Legacy” lightbar, and SoundOff interior lighting.

To make the Mach-E project unique, Gooch went to town by adding special under-hood “Frunklighting.” Controlled by four switches, the operator can turn on special green LED lighting for various Frunk configurations. Those same “OPS7” multi-colored lights were also installed under the vehicle for a real eye-catching look to the exterior. Gooch added some multi-colored Superior Signal blue/green lights to the frunk icebox as an accessory upgrade for community events. The

OPS7 undercarriage lighting is not just for show; it also can be added to the activation of emergency lights during Code 3 operation. One of the other special-use cases is the ability for the officer to have the undercarriage lighting on while simply patrolling a neighborhood. The public can then easily see the police vehicle at night and be assured the police presence is close by.

To enhance the emergency lighting even more, Gooch installed an interior lightbar up inside the windshield with visor mounting hardware. The rear quarter glass has 3-inch SoundOff Signal® MPower® LED lights. (https://soundoffsignal.com/) The rear bumper has dual blue 8EVP lights, along with EVP lights around the license plate bracket. The rear window has a 24-inch Code3 Outliner™ lightbar. (https://www.code3esg.com/