Some of the rifles used by the Port Townsend Police Department are decades old and the department plans to replace them with 15 new ones.

“Some of them are actually Vietnam [war] era,” said PTPD Chief Michael Evans of the department’s current rifle inventory. Other rifles are newer, but still more than a decade old. He said the old rifles were acquired by the department before he began his term as chief.

“All of them have pretty much gone beyond their life expectancy.”

Some of the current rifles were donated to the department by the federal government, Evans said. They are M-16s that had been converted from automatic fire to semiautomatic.

To replace them, the department ordered 15 new rifles at a cost of $22,491.72. That price includes taxes.

The new firearms are Daniel Defense M4V7S rifles, which are equivalent to AR-15s. The rifles, which come with front and rear “iron sights” and cases, were purchased from Kiesler Police Supply in Jeffersonville, Indiana.

Like the old ones, the new rifles are also semiautomatic.

“Weapons like this are available to the general public,” Evans said.

The department used to possess both rifles and shotguns, but has decided to stop using the shotguns.

Evans said the main reason to use a rifle as opposed to a service pistol is that rifles have higher accuracy and the bullets are designed to be less likely to pass through a target.

Evans said that if a rifle were needed, seconds could matter and officers would want to put an end to a dangerous situation as quickly as possible. The rifle’s bullets are also capable of penetrating body armor.

Evans said the rifles were primarily used for training and he could not recall a time when a police weapon was fired for purposes other than training. Firearms are also used for dispatching injured deer he said.

QUARTERLY TRAINING

Officers undergo quarterly training with live ammunition and also participate in computer-simulated training as well as training with real firearms loaded with a type of paintball ammunition.

“We train and prepare for active-shooter situations,” Evans said.

The rifles might be deployed if there was a viable threat or some other reason.

“It’s not common. There would have to be a reason for it,” he said of deploying a rifle.

Evans said that if there’s a high probability of something going awry, officers need to be prepared.

“The last thing we want to do is show up underprepared, under-equipped.”

When officers respond to something that’s relatively common, such as a bank alarm that was falsely set off, “we have to treat every one like it’s the real deal until it’s proven otherwise,” he said.

The rifles are locked in police vehicles for use by the department’s 15 officers and additional reserve officers.

Evans said the department would keep some of the older rifles that were in better condition. Removing the old rifles and having new ones shipped involved a lot of paperwork and dealing with federal requirements, Evans said.

“It’s a long process … it’s going to be a couple of months.”