At the February 10, 2021 City Commission meeting, an item was presented by the Administration to the City Commission to discuss and, if necessary, take action regarding the Police Department’s budget to determine whether additional funds would be needed to maintain law and order in the City, which, after discussion, resulted in this item being referred to the Finance and Economic Resiliency Committee (FERC) for further discussion.
On February 19, 2021, the FERC discussed the Police Department’s budget to determine what additional resources could help the Police Department effectively maintain law and order in the City. After extensive discussion, the FERC favorably recommended the item and directed that funding for the following three initiatives be submitted for approval to the City Commission to enhance staffing and accelerate the implementation of key technology as quickly as possible to address high priority issues in the City’s Art Deco Cultural District (ADCD).
Enhanced Staffing
This proposal would add 15 police officers and 2 sergeants over a 3-year period to augment staffing in the ADCD. The additional officers would be dedicated to the ADCD to provide a higher level of service while ensuring that resources are not redirected from other parts of the City and would reduce the need for overtime with staffing returning to current levels as officers retire or attrit over the 3-year timeframe. At that time, the effectiveness of the additional staffing can be evaluated for potential permanent staffing decisions.
This one-time enhancement is estimated at $5.5 million over a 3-year period, including personnel costs and all necessary vehicles and equipment that would be needed for these additional sworn positions being temporarily added. This proposed amendment would require an appropriation of approximately $1.8 million in the Police Department’s General Fund budget from General Fund reserves for the addition of these 17 sworn positions (15 police officers and 2 sergeants). The $1.8 million would cover the pro-rated cost for FY 2021 (six months) and includes funding for all necessary vehicles and equipment needed for these additional temporary sworn positions proposed to be added.
Accelerate Installation of Security Cameras in the ADCD
There are multiple closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera projects underway in the ADCD and throughout the City, which include numerous General Obligation (G.O.) Bond projects, Capital Improvement Projects, and regular maintenance, repair, and upgrade projects for the Police and many other City departments. The Police Department indicated that accelerating these projects was limited by the size of and demands placed on the small team working on them. To accelerate these projects, there were two specific requests that would ease the burden and allow more work to be conducted in parallel.
The first was a request for the City to identify and select a primary CCTV Camera Integrator (and backups) that would be contracted for smaller scope projects (when the job order contracting process was not required) and complete maintenance and repairs on a time and materials basis. Allocating a pool of funds to pay the CCTV Integrator to complete these tasks would reduce dependence on Police staff that currently handle this work.
The Police Department also requested a mechanism to hire contracted foremen/project managers to handle the day-to-day project management tasks once projects entered the construction phase such as job-site inspections, permitting, right-of-way requests, delivery of materials, documentation of progress, etc. By outsourcing these tasks, it would allow much more time for internal staff to focus on the design and planning of existing projects and implementation of completed projects that would still require significant work in order to be integrated into the City’s centralized video management system once the construction phase was completed.
Based on the two specific requests made by the Police Department for accelerating installation of security cameras in the ADCD, this proposed amendment would appropriate $500,000 in the Police Department’s General Fund budget from General Fund reserves to establish a primary citywide CCTV Camera Integrator and contract with ad hoc project managers to ensure the effective progress of CCTV and networking infrastructure construction projects.
Creation of a Real Time Crime Center (RTCC)
To fully leverage the existing and new security cameras and license plate readers (LPR’s) that are being installed in the ADCD and throughout the City, the Police Department highly recommended the creation of a Real Time Crime Center (RTCC), which would be a centralized center at the Police Department’s headquarters that could properly display feeds and information from security cameras and LPR’s in real time. This would help leverage and focus existing staffing and resources, as well as help the investigations division analyze and learn more from post incident events.
While the Police Department continues to work with the Property Management Department to identify a potential location at the Police headquarters building for the RTCC, which is critical due to the needed network infrastructure and ready access for Police command staff and other units, the hardware and furniture, fixtures, and equipment (FFE) needed to create the RTCC is currently unbudgeted and estimated at $1.5 million and would likely need to be funded from General Fund reserves. Once a suitable location is identified, the Police Department will move forward with the buildout and implementation.
Currently, the Police Department is utilizing light duty staff to monitor the security cameras and LPR’s that are currently in place. Due to the higher number of cameras and LPR’s being installed citywide and the need to provide more robust use of the technology to support operations, the Police Department also recommended the addition of two non-sworn Crime Analysis Specialist positions at an estimated annual cost of $180,000 ($90,000 pro-rated for FY 2021).
Until the full RTCC is built, the Police Department proposes the implementation of two measures to achieve immediate results. First, the capabilities of the current monitoring locations would be enhanced by acquiring specialized technology. Secondly, the two civilian positions previously described would be filled and provide consistent monitoring during peak hours while also augmenting the Police Department’s crime-fighting initiatives until the RTCC’s projected completion date in late Spring 2022.
In order to implement these two measures, this proposed amendment would appropriate approximately $1.6 million in the Police Department’s General Fund budget from General Fund reserves to enhance the capabilities of the current monitoring locations through the acquisition of specialized technology until the RTCC is completed and add two non-sworn Crime Analysis Specialist positions for which the cost is pro-rated for FY 2021.