The Lake Charles City Council voted to approve bids for public safety uniforms and new equipment for the Lake Charles Police Department and Lake Charles Fire Department at Wednesday’s meeting.

On an annual basis, LCPD and LCFD conducts a bid process to establish a 12-month contract period for the purchase of public safety uniforms on an as needed basis.

Uniforms for public safety employees – LCPD and LCFD – face plenty of wear and tear, said LCPD Deputy Chief Franklin Fondel.

“If you are looking at a patrolman, they are wearing these uniforms twelve hours a day… you’re not just in a police car. At any point it can turn into you trying to detain someone to keep them from hurting themselves or be on foot because somebody is trying to flee,” he explained.

The uniforms can also become damaged solely from officers carrying police equipment on their person.

Officers get updated and new Class A uniforms – uniforms for day-to-day wear – as they move through the ranks, he said, with uniforms exhibiting different rank structures and color schemes.

The uniforms are custom fit for each officer to ensure they can conduct their duties properly.

The Council unanimously authorized the city to award the bid to Acadian Promotional Products for $1,597.11.

The Council also approved a bid to purchase 28 sets of structural firefighting bunker gear for the LCFD.

The major components of these sets include the outer shell, inner thermal liner and moisture barrier, said Delton “DC” Carter, LCFD Fire Chief.

Much like the LCPD Class A uniforms, structural firefighting gear sets are custom fit to each individual firefighter. “The components of the gear can vary from department to department, but mainly from person to person,” said Carter.

The sets purchased will replace existing gear and provide gear for new hires.

The bid was awarded to North American Fire Equipment Company for $59,125.

The LCFD will also be adding a new fire truck to their fleet soon. Currently, they have a total of 20 trucks – pumper trucks and ladder trucks. Fifteen of these trucks are considered front line response units. The other five are reserve units.

As per the city’s agreement with Calcasieu Parish to serve the entirety of Ward 3, LCFD also has two tanker trucks to serve the areas that are not within Lake Charles’ city limits.

At the Council meeting on April 19, the Council authorized the city to enter into an agreement with Bulldog Fire Apparatus to purchase one new Ferrara Custom Pumper Truck. Depending on its size, these trucks can hold from 300 to 1,250 gallons of water and can have a flow rate of up to 5,500 gallons per minute.