Mansfield Police Dept. mobile operations center nearly set for duty

MANSFIELD — Nicole Gearhart knows her dad made sure the right vehicles, equipment and personnel arrived on the scene of Mansfield fires for more than 40 years.

A Mansfield Police Department sergeant, Gearhart leads the team that will ensure the unit’s mobile operations center does the same in the days, weeks and years ahead.

The daughter of retired Mansfield fire Capt. Dan Krizan, Gearhart was selected to lead the team of officers to drive and guide the new 38-foot, $862,079 custom-built, coach-style command center from Farber Speciality Vehicles in Columbus.

The vehicle, ordered by the MPD in 2024, is now in service with the department.

City Council members got their first look at it Tuesday evening and the post will be fully operational in about two weeks, officials said.

Mayor Jodie Perry and city lawmakers used a bit of financial creativity to replace a 31-year-old vehicle the city purchased used more than a decade ago.

The idea for replacing the current mobile command post began with former Chief Keith Porch, when Bammann was assistant chief. Porch is now the city’s safety service director.

It was paid for with $275,779 in American Rescue Plan Act funds and $586,300 from 2024 police salaries that were not spent due to vacant positions in a department that was still struggling to recruit additional officers.

It’s housed at Mansfield Fire Department Station 4 on South Main Street when not being used.

The diesel-powered vehicle has a 20,000-watt generator and could run for three days straight on its own, if needed.

Chief Jason Bammann said one of the primary uses of the vehicle is for emergency situations that can require a long-term law enforcement presence, such as a hostage standoff like the three-hour situation that took place in October 2024 on Cline Avenue.

In such a situation, the operations center can be divided into three separate rooms, each with multiple video screens on the walls.

The front section would be for department and city leaders. The middle would be occupied by the incident commander, the SWAT commander and the hostage negotiator. The rear compartment would be the communications center, used by 911 dispatchers and others.

The chief said there is also a camera on a tether that can “fly” up to 100 feet above the command post to provide video surveillance around the area near the operations center, offering a 360-degree view.

The unit is also available to other law enforcement agencies around the county, or even the state, during emergencies.

But the new vehicle can be used for much more, he said.

Bammann acknowledged that when people see the current mobile command post on the road, they assume something bad has happened.

“I want to get away from that,” he said.

The vehicle can also be used at small community events, such as the upcoming annual Bike-A-Palooza at North Lake Park, as well as major events, including the annual Inkcarceration Music & Tattoo Festival that attracts 75,000 people over three days to the grounds of the former Ohio State Reformatory.

It’s not like driving a police cruiser

“(Bammann) last year put out an opportunity for anybody who’s up for this new adventure with the new mobile command unit,” said Gearhart, who remains a first-shift patrol sergeant in addition to her new duties.

She raised her hand and ultimately was selected to head the 14-member team, putting in extra time in addition to her work on patrol.

“It’s very fortunate for me,” said Gearhart, who joined the MPD in 2008.

Maneuvering the huge new mobile command post is not as simple as driving a standard police vehicle. It’s as long the firetrucks her dad once used.

Gearhart and her team went through a week-long driving course on maneuverability and street driving to make sure they were ready.

“We all want to be able to get into this truck and get it where it needs to go safely and learn all the bells and whistles. You’re going to see a lot of switches in there … that it’s not just driving,” she said.

“It’s like driving a big Cadillac, knowing where your pivot points are, where you turn, because we have a tail swing. It’s just getting in and learning it. This maneuverability course has really helped us a lot in figuring out what we’re capable of and we have spotters out to make sure we don’t hit anything,” she said.

“We will always operate with a two-man driving team,” she said.

Once the command post arrives on scene, the team will make sure it’s secure in place. They will bring up spotlights for a night-time scene, assist with the drone and work to assist command staff and IT members as needed.

“At community events, we’ll set it up and we’ll bring the kids in and show them how everything works and it’s pretty exciting,” Gearhart said.

Officials say the technology makes the difference

The IT is led by Mark Huckleberry, the city’s IT director. He was the city’s communications center operations supervisor when the idea for the new command post was approved by City Council.

The command post will function with dispatchers aboard. In fact, if the need arose due to an emergency at the Municipal Building, the post could handle dispatch duties for the entire city, according to Huckleberry. It adds three additional dispatch work stations to the four in the city building.

“If something were to happen for some reason at the city building, we get a funky haz-mat situation to where we have to evacuate the building or something occurs that we can’t physically be in that building … this will take over as dispatch,” Bammann said.

The command post is equipped with a Starlink system to guarantee internet access, the chief said.

“It’s unreal the capabilities that this thing has,” the chief said.

Huckleberry said the command post is “essentially a (police) precinct.”

“Essentially, we’re going to have this so we can expand MPD out to a second location and we can operate. The only thing it doesn’t have is a holding cell for prisoner or something of that nature,” he said.

“We can do full radio operations for police and fire in the city,” he said. “It’s nice to have an asset like this in a town of our nature. I feel blessed to have it.”

Huckleberry knows the command post technology from the communications standpoint, as well as the other technology on board.

“My specialty, I guess, would be public safety technology. I kind of am a jack-of-all trades when it comes to technology.

“My goal is to get it so people can use it and it works like they want it to.”

In a department and an industry that still struggles to meet manpower goals, Bammann said the new command post could also help in recruiting new officers.

“We have to impress. We all know that it’s a cut-throat game right now with recruiting and retention. Currently, I send two officers and a cruiser with a fold-up table and a half cover, with the MPD (logo) into a gymnasium and we’re like, ‘Come to the MPD.’

“I want to take this and park it at the front door. It looks like a billboard. When people are coming in, I want to say, ‘Hey, come here, talk to us first,” the chief said.

(Below are photos taken April 3 of the new Mansfield Police Department mobile command post.)