YORK — The York Police Department presented its state-of-the-art drug analyzing device at the York City Council meeting on Thursday.
The device, Police Office bates presented, can identify around 4000 types of drugs — everything from the hallucinogen DMT to fentanyl. It shoots lasers at the substance and creates a graph of the possible chemicals in the substance.
“Unless it’s a nuke, this thing can help us with it,” Bates said.
If York ever became concerned about chemical warfare, Bates joked, the department could download the relevant package to the device.
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According to Police Chief Tjaden, Bates was instrumental in the department’s decision to acquire the device.
Bates said that the device has been used on too many cases to count. “We have been able to identify a lot of things we wouldn’t have been using our previous method,” Bates said.
In a recent case, the police department was able to identify an unknown white powder as fentanyl using the device. It is helpful for the police so that they know what kind of substance they are interacting with and how dangerous it might be.
Councilmember Sheppard said, “I like the fact that it keeps you safe.”
On Thursday the city council also heard an update from the City Administrator Sue Crawford about some potential policy changes to the city’s ordinances. Some of the city’s ordinances, which were last overhauled in the 1970s, have become “obsolete,” Crawford said.
The city’s fines for violating the ordinances, for instance, would be increased to reflect inflation, Crawford said.
Crawford also presented an update to the ordinances which would allow the city administrator to delegate authority to hire and dismiss subordinate employees of the city. The update is a clarification of an existing ordinance, Crawford said. The council did a first read on this update and will vote on it at a future meeting.
The council also approved a quote for more traffic signals downtown. And the council also appointed York Director of Public Works James Paul as York’s Street Superintendent, which Crawford said is “important for our state street funding.”
At the end of the meeting, the council went into executive session to discuss economic development.
