With his left hand firmly on the wheel as the squad car’s speedometer steadily pointed to 100, Sgt. David Pike occasionally checked the map on his laptop with his right hand. After a few minutes, the blip of another squad car on the screen had reached the destination.

Technology has become an integral tool for officers of the Mower County Sheriff’s Department when responding to urgent calls or just patrolling the county.

For the last few years, each squad car has been equipped with a mobile data terminal featuring a touch screen laptop. One key feature the laptop provides is a map that uses GPS to show the location of each squad car in the department and each car in the Austin Police Department.

The addition of the computer system was an adjustment at first for officers. The laptop is between the two front seats about a foot high and can swivel from side to side. When the computers were added, Pike said all the cars had to be rearranged to make space.

The buttons to control the radar were moved to the right side of the laptop. The panel to control the lights and sirens moved from the dashboard to between the seats below the base of the laptop.

“It was quite an adjustment; everything got just jumbled around,” he said.

Pike is supervisor of his shift, and the map allows him to follow each of his officers as they patrol.

Pike said it’s difficult to plan where he’ll drive during his shift: “It’s wherever the radio takes you,” he said

Often times he’ll follow the other cars on the computer and then head in a different direction.

Despite an occasional bug in the technology, the computer has quickly become an integral part of the officers’ routine. After Pike accepted a radio call from dispatch to check a report of two dogs in the median of Interstate 90 east of Austin, the call appears on the computer screen in glowing white letters across the darkened screen.

Pike touched a box labeled “assigned” to accept the call and drove toward the mile marker.

Once he was on scene he touched another button to say he’s arrived on site. He later touched a “cleared” button after chasing the dog from the interstate.

About two hours later, he hit a button on his computer when he took a break to get coffee at the Lake Geo Travel Plaza in Dexter.

All the calls from the sheriff’s department and the APD cycle over the screen so a patrolman can follow where other officers are. Pike described the computer as a more streamlined approach, and said officers no longer need to rely solely on the radio to follow calls.

When he’s not responding to calls, Pike spends much of his 10-hour shift crisscrossing the county with his hand on the controls to the radar gun.

Covering more than 700 square miles can be a challenge. On a night with few deputies, Pike said he tries to patrol more in the center of the county to be able to respond to calls as they come in.

The added resources make a squad car into a mobile office and allow officers some flexibility. This keeps the officers on the road longer.

Before the cars were equipped with laptops, Pike said he’d often have to go back to the Mower County Government Center to write a report.

Now, Pike will park along a road — often in a field driveway — to write a report, and he’ll radar passing cars as he writes. He can then email the report to dispatch. The controls to the radar are located along the right side of the laptop panel.

“There are days when you literally wouldn’t have to go to the office if you didn’t want to,” Pike said.

“I hardly use scratch paper or the map anymore,” he added.

As Pike patrols the county’s roads at about 50 mph, he often listens to popular music from the ’80s and ’90s on his Sirius satellite radio. A shift that lasts until 1 a.m. can lead to some quiet evenings, and Pike said he’d go crazy without the radio.

The radio can provide a compelling soundtrack to the evening. Shortly before serving court documents in Brownsdale, Billy Idol’s “White Wedding” played when Pike pulled over and looked for the right house number with his search light.

The trunk of the Pike’s squad car is a tight puzzle of more traditional police gear like tire spikes, medical supplies, jumper cables, traffic cones and supplies to clean a road after a car crash.

Pike’s car has a respirator for going into meth labs, which he often does because he’s also the fire chief of the Brownsdale Fire Department.

“That’s kind of what I’m known for: the clean car and the organized trunk,” Pike said. “I’m the guy who carries a paint brush in the car for dusting.”

Pike’s squad car is a take home car, so he drives it to and from his home in Brownsdale each day. Pike said a take home car comes with added responsibility, especially because of the amount of time spent in the car: “Keep your office clean,” he said.