Columbus cops become trend police with new blue uniforms, ball caps
White button-down shirts and 8-point hats? That’s soooo past 10 years.
Officers and sergeants with the Columbus Division of Law enforcement will before long be a tiny a lot more “vogue ahead” when they patrol city streets and reply to calls for support.
Opting for comfort over formality, the division is phasing out daily use of the white shirts and 8-issue hats that have for decades been staples. Officers will instead transition to wearing a navy blue, polyester-blend shirt with an optional matching blue baseball cap. The division’s navy blue pants will continue being the same.
The new uniform will be carried out throughout the division all through the first 50 % of 2022.
New Columbus law enforcement uniforms: Simpler treatment, easier to don
The new shirts will have an embroidered badge and the officer’s name and badge variety embroidered on their shirts, both equally of which ought to be more obvious to citizens, Sgt. Joseph Albert claimed.
The new shirts will keep on to have a house for officers to dress in their human body cameras, and are designed to be extra comfortable and practical for officers, Albert explained.
For the exterior vests, which are now offered with the modify in shirts, there is a suspender-like wearable choice, permitting for additional equivalent pounds distribution and decreasing hip and lower-back again pressure.
Bicycle, motorbike and mounted unit officers will have reflective striping on the sleeves of their shirts as a protection measure, Albert explained.
The new shirts are also envisioned to be less difficult to keep clear and hide dirt than the white shirts, Albert mentioned. The navy blue is identical to what is worn by Columbus firefighters.
Police will keep on to dress in the white uniform shirts at formal instances, these kinds of as promotions, ceremonies and funerals, and they will carry on to be worn by some command personnel.
The new uniform design and style approach commenced in March 2019 with a study in which just about 1,600 officers supplied input. Albert explained that a lot more than 90% of the officers who responded stated that they wished to be in a position to don their bulletproof vests on the exterior of their uniform shirt, which is fewer challenging on officers’ hips and backs, as very well as currently being a lot more breathable, keeping officers’ system heat down.
Officers commenced tests new uniform variations shortly following the study in 2019, Albert claimed, and Main Elaine Bryant and Assistant Main LaShanna Potts accredited the uniform improve in 2021.
The most the latest graduates of the James G. Jackson Columbus Law enforcement Academy ended up issued the new uniforms.
The uniform transform arrives with no further price tag to the metropolis, which supplies officers with a set selection of uniform items and machines below the terms of its agreement with the Fraternal Order of Law enforcement.
Albert explained officers who would like to have on their vest on the exterior of their uniform shirt will have to purchase the provider for the vest them selves.