Travis County Commssioners Court
January 20, 2004
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Item 36
Now, 36 is to consider and take appropriate action on proposal to create 15 additional law enforcement deputy positions for the patrol division of the sheriff's office as part of the fy 2004 county challenge initiative.
>> move approval.
>> second.
>> does the sheriff need to tell us exactly what this is?
>> what this is, very briefly, is that the court in response to the continuing needs for increased law enforcement personnel, set apart half a million dollars, is what I think Karen and some other person initially called the challenge grant. And the idea was that we were to find an equal amount of savings within the sheriff's office. And we have done that by redeploying some people from our community services program and also redeploying seven officers from the jail due to some new technology that the court approved this last year, plus some changes that the jail standards allowed us to make. Combined with that some grant funds, what we're able to do with your money and our money, which we all know is the taxpayer's money, is to place 15 new patrol officers out on the streets. The best news is that four of them will be there immediately upon approval. And the other 11 will begin training immediately because they're already employed by us, they're already certified peace officers or dual certified people who work in our jail system, and they will see the streets probably around the second week of February. They'll be out in patrol cars. They'll still be in their field training program, but they'll actually be out there responding to calls and taking care of the need.
>> sheriff, number one, i'd like to congratulate you on coming up with the matching funds. (indiscernible). Let me ask you a question. Has there been any objection to anybody in the corrections phase of the jail, they're basically in full approval as far as moving forward with this? Have we had any opposition from those folks?
>> I haven't heard of any opposition, Commissioner. The only way that things like this work, quite frankly, is through a very good cooperative working relationship, particularly among the command staff that are assigned both to the james and to the law enforcement -- jai and to the law enforcement part. The jail folks are the ones who -- they are the people that are age to -- and all of them are able to look at things and figure out more efficient ways to look at things. I sometimes ask probing questions, but they're the ones who came up with this idea.
>> and number two, when the court approves this, there will be nine f.t.e.'s, patrol officers, where I'm understanding basically they'll be operating on the east, northeast and southeast quadrant of the county. Let me ask this: when will the folks out in this portion of Travis County expect these persons to be out on patrol and of course the capitol, which is a part of this, but also the personnel to also do the patrolling out in this part of the county?
>> like I said, Commissioner, we've deployed them six to the west command and nine to the east command. And people will actually start seeing these deputies within a matter of a couple of weeks. They'll be out there -- they'll be in class for a little bit, just making sure that all the report writing skills and their -- the updates and things like this. But by about the second week of February they'll actually start seeing them out in patrol cars. What they'll see at first is them riding with the field training officer. We're not gog to take people, even though they're certified officers, who some of them have spent their entire career working in the jail and they haven't been out on the streets, pe se, so they'll be in a field training program, but they'll be out there and you'll start seeing them the second week of February. And depending on the progress of the individual officer, how soon they'll be by themselves. But part of it is also -- part of this packet is that we have to get some vehicles for them, but we'll take care of that also.
>> this is recommended by pbo also?
>> yes.
>> yes, sir. I'll let them come up and speak for themselves, but we've worked hand in hand with the planning and budget office on this.
>> yes, judge.
>> so the -- from the amount we have in reserve, whatever amount is needed this year will be taken out and you'll see an impact next year of $274,142?
>> that's correct, sir.
>> we've attempted to design it in such a way as to have the least ongoing impact on future budgets.
>> okay. Commissioner Sonleitner moves approval.
>> second.
>> let me say this, I really appreciate this because we've been dpretly in need of extra patrol officers out in -- well, in all parts of the county. We have a lot of illegal dumping down 969 and parts east. So these officers will be greatly welcome.
>> they won't address all the need, but at least gets us started in the right direction.
>> we appreciate that.
>> thank you very much.
>> all in favor of the motion? That passes by unanimous vote.
Last Modified: TUesday, January 21, 2004 8:25 AM