If I were a cop with the Eden Prairie Police Department, I’d give the chief an ultimatum: Either you issue me a mint cherry red ‘75 Ford Gran Torino with a 351 Windsor V-8 engine, dual racing mirrors and white vector stripes running down both sides, or you issue me whatever Mel Gibson drove in Mad Max. The chief, in response, would probably reveal a third option I had not considered: permanent shower room cleaning detail.
But members of the EPPD may soon drive very cool cars indeed, because the force added a Tesla to their fleet of vehicles in December of 2020. Police officers are selective of every piece of equipment they take out into the field, which is why the EPPD has put Sgt. Scott Mittelstadt in charge of carefully assessing the inaugural Tesla’s trial performance.
Sgt. Mittelstadt first hit the road with the Minnesota State Patrol in 2004, and spent the next three years watching over a small patch of asphalt by the intersection of I-94 and 35W. Policing highway traffic can be exciting, yet Sgt. Mittelstadt wanted a little more variety out of his career in law enforcement – partnering with a K9 unit, for example, and serving in a SWAT team. More than anything else he wanted to work in a good neighborhood, hence his reason for joining the EPPD.
“I knew I would enjoy working for the positive community we have here,” said Sgt. Mittelstadt while his radio chirped away in the background. “It’s a nice, clean city, where people wave to me when I drive by in my squad car. That’s endearing, and makes for a much more rewarding career in law enforcement than focusing only on highway operations.
“I was promoted in 2019, and with that I became the sergeant in charge of our fleet. I manage our cars – recording damage, tracking equipment needed, and making sure everything will run smoothly for our officers.
“We knew our department would eventually have to look into operating electric vehicles. That’s just the way the future is panning out. My supervisors and the city council decided to purchase our Tesla before I was assigned to monitor its performance. It was more expensive than the standard Charger or Explorer, but after weighing the Tesla’s reduced maintenance cost and higher resale value they anticipated it would be more cost-effective than the traditional alternatives.
“A police vehicle is no different from any other piece of equipment. You expect it to work hard and endure heavy wear and tear, and you want to be certain it will stand up to the rigorous demands of law enforcement. Testing any piece of equipment before an officer’s safety depends on it is crucial to this job. That’s why we started with just the one Tesla – so we can assess its performance for ourselves.
“I’m not the Tesla’s primary driver. While I’ve assigned that duty to one of our patrol officers, I do take it out every now and then so I can familiarize myself with how it handles. And it does take getting used to. A Tesla doesn’t have a standard gear shifter, and every knob and switch you’re used to is on a touchscreen. But once I got the muscle memory down, the car did operate to my expectations.
“A Tesla has a lot of get up and go. Although its top speed doesn’t make it the EPPD’s fastest vehicle, the Tesla’s acceleration does beat out any other squad car in our fleet. It’s just effortless when you want to speed up in that vehicle. It’ll push you right back into your seat if you let it.
“Acceleration is more important for our purposes anyway. You may have to put the pedal on the floor during a highway pursuit, but those are pretty rare for city police.
“Whether the Tesla is actually cost-effective or not remains to be seen. We speculate it will cost $2,000 less to maintain as compared to a Charger over the course of a squad car’s 100,000 mile lifespan. Speculation is not enough, of course. We intend to determine exactly how long the battery is going to last, how well it’s going to survive our harsh winters, and whether it’s truly up to the demands of law enforcement before we commit to adding more Teslas to our fleet.
“Can an electric squad car have the same presence as a traditional one? Well, there is something to be said about the sound of a gas engine. When you call for backup and hear that, you take relief knowing help is on its way. But old school cops who are used to old school cars have to keep in mind that police technology is constantly evolving. In time, I think even they are going to embrace the electric vehicle.”