Supply Hurdle

Santa Fe Police have quietly paused a plan to replace more of the force’s gas-powered vehicle fleet with hybrids, pointing to supply chain disruptions that have made them hard to source.

City Council recently approved the department’s request to buy 24 replacement police vehicles, six of them traditionally powered and 18 with “Ecoboost” gas engines. Purchasing gas-powered vehicles represents a backtrack for the department, which has been buying hybrids since 2015, but a temporary reversal, councilors and police say.

Other agencies in New Mexico are also being squeezed between a desire for hybrid/electrics and COVID-related supply chain shortages. The Albuquerque Journal recently reported that the city, Bernalillo County and state transportation department have all had trouble meeting goals for alternative-fuel vehicles.

SFR asked Santa Fe officials for other examples of city departments delaying or canceling hybrid vehicle orders, but received none. The city Sustainability Dashboard shows 17 new hybrids were added to the fleet in February 2022.

Santa Fe Police had been allocated $1.2 million in the last fiscal year as part of its transition to pursuit-capable hybrid vehicles. But the department said in a memo to councilors that “supply chain issues” led them to defer most of that vehicle purchase last budget year, by which point per-vehicle costs were so much higher that they settled on “fuel-efficient Ecoboost engines” rather than hybrids. The memo called them “the next-best option.”

A hybrid’s electric motor takes over from the gas engine when the vehicle idles. Police vehicles spend a lot of time idling, hence the potential fuel savings.

“We want to look at vehicles that will help us out with cost and with reducing our carbon footprint in the community, and that can stand up to the rigors of police work,” Deputy Police Chief Ben Valdez tells SFR. “We’re even looking at plug-in electric for some uses. Maintenance and fuel savings, those are intriguing to us.”

The 24 police vehicles, including equipment and labor, cost almost $1.6 million: 18 Ford Police Interceptor utility vehicles with Ecoboost, to replace some of the force’s sedans; five Ford F150 Responder pickups for operations, training and community relations tasks; one Ford F150 for the Animal Services supervisor.

COVID-related delays slowed the delivery of parts for electric and hybrid vehicles globally and in Santa Fe. Police have dealt with canceled hybrid orders in the past few years—they received only 25 of 46 last year, with up to a 10-month wait time, according to Valdez.

Feeling the pinch, Santa Fe Police went with the Ecoboost engines for the 18 Interceptor utilities. The other vehicles have to do things like pull horse trailers on occasion, and there aren’t currently good engine alternatives.

“We would have liked to see these Ecoboosts be hybrids, but it’s hard for us to wait so long,” Valdez says. “The platform is tried-and-true, and it gives us the performance and fuel mileage we need.”

The department has 28 patrol-rated hybrids now, and another 15 hybrids in the fleet that aren’t necessarily used for patrol, Valdez says.

Officials tell SFR that nothing has changed in the commitment to hybrids where they can fit a need.

“There’s a lot of support for hybrid vehicles and the city has sustainability goals to meet,” District 2 Councilor and Finance Committee Chair Carol Romero-Wirth says, “So I see no reason we won’t go back once the supply chains are back to normal.”