That's the Four corners area, and a lot of the area just isn't easily accessible. It's not so much the armor as the go anywhere aspect. (The armor is just a free "gift" with purchase.) those things have massive engines, high torque and clearance and their undercarriages are hardened, so getting through a gully won't rip out an axle. (Also, they float and have snorkel kits. Who knew?)
I spent my teens on the Arizona side of the region, and there were times you just couldn't get there from here. (Start with the crap funding BIA puts into Rez roads, the even less Arizona invests into anything that doesn't have federal money, then add wind, flash floods, wild fire...) My sophomore year, Shiprock had only 1 road in for about 7 months when a bridge got squished. Parts NE of there had to go up through Utah to get back to Tuba City. In the last few years, fire in the area had been bad, and I could see having a heavy vehicle for that.
And there's the free aspect, because it is a free vehicle. LE and S&R would take just about anything they could get cheap and splash paint on, back then. I can't imagine that's changed much -- on the Arizona side, there are too many sovereign citizens in the area still dealing with their fee-fees because the big bad USA wouldn't let their great-grandparents have a theocracy and thus either refusing to pay taxes or keeping the counties starved.
But the fuel and maintenance cost have to be worth more than free hardware. I'm pretty sure even a jacked, lifted, protected Suburban with a snorkel kit is cheaper to run and maintain than an MEV, not to mention easier to drive with less training and more versatile.
The Weld County and Yuma County ones... Those are my WTF, SRSLY? Is Wyoming going to invade? Will the cattle riot? Don't tell me Weld is scared of us in the People's Republic... Or that the Erie/Longmont tax base is going to get sick of no services and jump ship.
And why does Weld need two? Are they jousting? (Which would be entertaining in a demolition derby sort of way...) I'd really like to know what the rationale was on those.
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