The Hamlet Police Department has been unsuccessful at solving its computer problems, so now it’s buying new ones. Town Marshal Clint Norem says the department’s two MacBooks had been outfitted with Windows XP, since the police department’s software isn’t compatible with the Mac operating system. However, that led to some problems, and an IT firm was recently brought in to solve them.
“The issue we’re having is the IT spent at least two hours over there getting programs to work that, the following day, locked up on me again,” Norem told the town council Wednesday. “With Windows XP, it’s no longer supported by Microsoft. There’s a lot of security risk with it, and unfortunately, that’s not going to work because we have to access federal websites.”
That led the IT consultant to suggest purchasing new Windows-based computers, instead. On Wednesday, the town council voted to allow Norem to buy three HP computers, for a cost of just over $3,300. Norem said the additional computer will be placed in the evidence room, to allow evidence to be tracked digitally.
However, he’s still convinced that the MacBooks are good computers and says they’ll work fine, as long as they’re not running Windows software. He plans to give one to the Hamlet Fire Department and the other one to the town’s Street Department.
