Arizona Police Department Transitions Legacy Dispatch System to Cloud Platform

Flagstaff police and the city's emergency communications center will migrate from a 25-year-old on-premises dispatch and records system to a cloud-based platform, with the transition expected to complete by July 2027. The Flagstaff City Council approved the contract replacement in September 2026, noting that the legacy Hexagon system no longer meets operational needs despite serving the police and fire departments plus ten regional partner agencies. City officials clarified that the software upgrade does not expand data collection capabilities or establish new data-sharing arrangements.

The Flagstaff police and emergency communications center have operated on Hexagon-licensed software since 2001, running locally on city-owned servers. After two decades of use, the platform's limited functionality prompted officials to seek modernization. The transition to Versaterm, a cloud-based provider already operating in the Phoenix area, involves a phased rollout with parallel system operation during changeover. Implementation costs total approximately $1.2 million upfront, followed by $830,000 annually with a 5% annual cap on increases.

The shift addresses infrastructure vulnerabilities in the current setup. A single equipment failure or facility damage could disable dispatch operations entirely. Cloud-based redundancy across multiple secure data centers may improve system resilience. Additionally, moving away from on-premises servers could reduce long-term maintenance expenses and capital outlays—city officials noted that new server hardware alone would cost roughly $1.5 million.