RIVIERA, Texas — Area law enforcement gathered in Kleberg County this morning to see demonstrations of new technology meant to help communication.
South Texas first responders from Corpus Christi, Edinburg, McAllen, Harlingen and other agencies gathered at Kaufer-Hubert Memorial Park in Riviera. Sheriff Richard Kirkpatrick and Kleberg County Judge Rudy Madrid also attended the event.
There, they saw featured equipment from FirstNet, a nationwide broadband communications platform built for the public safety community.
According to FirstNet, their platform will allow public safety agencies to "get more information quickly" and help them "make faster and better decisions."
Organizers of the event said the Kleberg County Sheriff's Office has been using FirstNet for two years. Along with introducing area enforcement to FirstNet, the expo also featured an interactive robotic dog demonstration, and drone demonstrations.
"We have now been able to bring this into a public safety, law enforcement aspect, and we're looking to see how this machine can in fact help our officers in the future with safety-related tasks, or being able to go into, or certain situations we may not want to send an officer into," Kirkpatrick said.
