Thursday, October 1, 2026
The Long Beach City Council approved a resolution on July 6 for the purchase of a new radio repeater system, as the Long Beach Police Department has been operating with an emergency backup system and is in need of a replacement, City Manager Charles Theofan said. The system provides communication between all police car radios and hand held radios with police headquarters. In 2006, New York state gave municipalities the opportunity to purchase such equipment at favorable prices. In Long Beach’s case, that would be $46,955.42 for a new system from Motorola in Hauppauge.
A radio repeater is a combination of a radio receiver and a radio transmitter that receives a weak or low-level signal and retransmits it at a higher level or higher power, so that the signal can cover longer distances without degradation as its sent to patrol cars and hand-held devices used by police.
City Manager Charles Theofan explained that the city is looking to replace outdated equipment from 1990, which has long exceeded its 10-year lifespan. The company which manufactured the system doesn’t even make parts for it anymore, Theofan said. In the spring, Theofan said that the repeater system broke down and police officers communicated via cell phones until it was repaired.
