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It's a food fixaday.

Well, we're here at Rasa Park, 38th in Navajo.

We got a very good playground, very nice.

Brand new basketball court, new irrigation, new trees, new plants, and a bunch more picnic tables for people to enjoy.

We were raised here on a 41st and Zoo night, not far from here.

And we've always lived here in the community.

Our graduation ceremony when I graduated was actually here.

Denver doing a lot for a lot of parks in the community.

The way they got it designed.

It brings a lot more people to parks and these parks after the investment happens.

These parks look very good.

And there's nothing that I don't love about doing the construction.

It's hot out there.

We have a briefing from DPD on staffing in the crime lab and other uh records bureau.

It's things like that, and fleet maintenance.

And we have four items on consent for those members here that'll go forward if there's no objection by the end of the meeting.

So uh let me start with introductions and uh let me start on my left.

Oh, I know today.

Hi everybody, Sadana Gonzalo Scruchetta's one of your council members at large.

Uh good morning, Paul Cashman, South Denver District 6.

Good morning, Diana Romero Campbell, Southeast Denver District 4.

Thank you.

All that uh Chief Why don't you take it away?

Uh I'm sorry, we have someone online.

I did not log into teams, so I apologize.

Uh introductions of members online.

Uh good morning, Jamie Torres, West Denver District 3.

Thank you.

Is there anyone else?

No, okay.

Thank you, Chief.

I apologize, uh Councilwoman.

I will log into teams now.

Chief, take it away.

Okay, certainly.

Uh good morning, uh Chief Thomas, General Police Department.

So I believe the original intent of this presentation was to talk about staffing challenges in our crime lab.

However, I think it's important for us to talk about the staffing challenges that we also have and some of our other critical assignments.

So in today's presentation, you can go to the slide.

So in today's presentation, in addition to talking about crime lab staffing, we'll also talk about staffing and records ID and fleet maintenance.

Each of these assignments are essential operate operational partners.

We support officers, investigations, evidence processing, court obligations, and the daily delivery of police services.

Adequate staffing and all these behind-the-scenes units is necessary for us to meet legal requirements, reduce delays in both uh we'll reduce delays and liability, maintain officer availability and operate as a modern efficient police department.

Next slide.

So we'll start with uh records ID.

So the identification section handles uh background checks, uh proof of clearance, rest records, and employee IDs.

Our records unit obviously handles accident and crime reports.

Um low staffing and records ID police places DPD at risk of non-compliance with legal requirements while disrupting critical operations, delaying investigations, and reducing officer availabilities.

Some specific examples include uh PR and bomb releases.

Shortages can prevent warrant checks uh from being completed within the four-hour uh release deadline, placing DPD out of compliance and risking the release of individuals wanted for serious crimes.

After hours ID verification, officers may have to release someone or stay out of service two or three hours waiting for identity comfort confirmation, creating civil liability response time concerns.

And the case scanning, this is where they scan all of the paper documents uh into our system.

This unit is approximately two and a half hours, two and a half months behind creating discovery problems and delays in producing court documents, and then in missing persons, missing persons information must be entered into NCIC within six hours.

And staffing shortages can place DPD out of compliance.

Good morning.

My name is David Chamberlain.

I'm the HR director for the Department of Safety.

Um I'll be kind of providing some of the deep dive into the numbers of our staffing.

Uh we'll see similar charts for all three uh divisions that we're gonna be talking about, so hopefully it'll become more familiar as we go through this presentation.

Um right now in the records ID, uh we have a total of 45 positions, of which 60 percent are filled.

Um staffing, as you can imagine, is very fluid throughout the year.

Um, people resign, move somewhere else, we get requisitions opened, we uh recruit and hire.

So these numbers are always in flux uh throughout the year.

Right now we have three job requisitions, of which I think we have a few that are about to start in the near future.

Um so we are actively recruiting to um help uh stabilize this uh staffing here in the records ID unit.

Uh just for your uh review, these are the types of positions that exist within uh the records ID unit.

Um we have uh a director, management, um, as well as supervision, um, and the majority of our staff uh are our law enforcement records technicians as the chief described.

Um they are you know really focused on detail-oriented records work within the law enforcement area.

Uh it requires extreme precision and detailed nature, um, which does make it a little bit more difficult to staff these positions because of the high scrutiny of of making errors within this state.

Um you can see that right now our focus is um for our three requisitions are all for law enforcement records text.

That's where the primary uh responsibilities are uh within this work, and so we're actually working to hire more uh to do this critical work.

This is our five-year staffing overview.

As I mentioned, it's it's very much in flux, so I wanted to provide some detail on kind of our trends over the last five years.

Um, so you can see uh over that time, uh, not only has the count of positions, which is sort of our top line budget amount uh gone down, but as well as our our overall strength within the unit.

And this graph is taken from these uh counts of workers, so you can see um you know, since 2021, we've had a strength of 61, and now our strength um into the beginning of this year is down to 43 within this unit.

Okay, so um next is our our fleet maintenance team, and so our department has hundreds of vehicles from patrol cars to SUVs, motorcycles, uh other specialized units that we use to respond to emergencies or uh conduct enforcement throughout the city.

Um and as you know, DPD has improved our staffing over the last couple of years, uh, but there's always you know there's often not enough serviceable vehicles for those additional officers.

And those vehicle shortages require officers to sometimes double up.

So there's two officers in one vehicle, which kind of defeats the purpose because the way that we um dispatch officers to calls, we dispatch per unit, and so we're only able to cover one call with a two-officer call car.

And so not only just doubling up people, you know, impact our response times, you know, having fewer cars, you know, I think impacts our ability to patrol the district and provide their proactive patrol.

Uh these graphs look familiar.

This is the same, uh, as I mentioned, the same uh numbers that we'll run through for fleet as well.

Um our total strength is 36 uh with 26 filled positions, which is a 72% fill or strength ratio.

Um right now we have two open uh job requisitions uh that we're actively looking to fill within the fleet uh department.

This is the type of roles that we have.

Um as the chief mentioned, our fleet is uh technicians are essential to keeping our our fleet on the road.

Uh we have uh fleet technicians ones uh and threes.

Uh the the ones typically do like the uh oil changes, the kind of quick uh things to keep our our our fleet moving, sort of the maintenance side of things, and our fleet tech threes handle a lot more of the more serious mechanical work, whether it's repairs, um getting some getting a car back on the road, um, or uh building out new vehicles, uh, you know, putting all the equipment that's necessary into the in the fleet vehicles.

Um we also have a collision team, which is does all the body work for our um our fleet, uh whether it's painting or dent repair, that kind of stuff.

Um so that's kind of the the scope of work that the fleet team does.

They also have management structure out there.

Um as you can see, we currently have a need for fleet tech threes, that's what one of our requisitions is open for, and uh fleet collision technicians um as well.

Uh so the body work repair side.

Here is our uh five-year uh staffing overview of the uh fleet.

As you can see, um our strength has gone down over the last few years, um, as well as our overall head count of our our workers.

And here is those numbers that that chart is made out of.

You can see we've gone from a strength of around 37-ish down to 29.

This department.

Uh finally we'll come to the crime lab.

Um crime lab uh is the forensics and evidence bureau.

They are uh an essential part of uh the criminal prosecution area of the criminal justice system.

Um they do high-quality investigations and they do it uh from a very scientific method.

Uh they have um the DNA side of things, they have firearms, latent prints, uh, they're the ones doing all the fun things that you would see on TV, right?

In all the true crime uh type type areas.

Um they are performing all that expert examination.

They also do all the a lot of the testifying within the the court system.

Um that is all the lab side of it.

They're also have a clean side of work, where they're out at the crime scenes, uh, collecting numbers.

So kind of two sides.

There's the lab work side, and then there's the actual field work side where where the um criminalists are out there collecting that that information.

Here's the current crime lab staffing.

Uh we have a total of 86 positions within this uh division, um 70 of which are filled, so we have a strength of 81% of positions with the crime lab.

Um right now there's 16 open positions and two uh active job requisitions to fill positions.

And I think, yeah, in my notes, uh we have actually one of those job requisitions is actively we have somebody selecting their starting next week.

So these are the type of positions that are within the uh crime lab.

As I mentioned, whenever you see something that says forensic scientists, you can think more of the lab side of things, they're the ones you know uh testing things, identifying uh you know whether what type of drug it is, or whether there's DNA that they can uh analyze, uh fingerprint analysis, that kind of thing.

And when you see the word criminalist, generally those are uh our employees that are out there in the field doing crime scene work, collecting that evidence in making sure it's preserved properly so that we can um analyze it in the lab.

Um there's some crossover on our firearms team where there's criminals on it, but generally speaking, those are the kind of uh sides of that.

Um we also have quality assurance section within that team to make sure that um obviously we are providing quality uh you know lab reports uh and that they're all peer-reviewed.

Those are the op those are the filled positions, these are the open positions currently, as you can see.

Um generally within the crime lab, uh the hardest to maintain full staffing is within the criminalist side of the the house, which is that crime scene unit.

Um we have I don't say we have uh no issues, but within the lab side, um we don't see as much attrition and turnover on that side.

And then here's our staffing um line chart over the last five years.

Um as you can see, uh overall strength is generally stayed the same, although over the last two years there has been a little bit of a downtrend uh in the amount of staff that we have had.

And here's those numbers.

Um as you can see from 2021 to 2025, we've actually added strength uh overall to the crime lab.

Um, and our numbers have stayed pretty much the same as far as how many workers we have over that same time period, although they've kind of grown and then and then you know declined again.

And then just as a final chart for you all to kind of compare these three uh divisions, um, this is the percent field, the their strength uh between the ID records, which is in the blue, the fleet, which is in the orange, and our crime lab, which was within the the gray part.

Quick presentation, hopefully painless, but what questions do we have?

Appreciate that, David.

Uh first up in the queue is Councilman Gonzalez Continue.

Thank you, um, Mr.

Chair.

Uh thank you all for this.

I I guess I have some questions on what you all see as the um issue rising to the top of like why you see some of maybe the turnover or why you see not as many why on the criminal criminalist side, um, what seems to be maybe the reason that folks aren't able to stay or having struggles there?

Uh quite honestly, I think it's a workload issue, and so I think that they work harder in Denver, there's more work to do, and I think pay is probably consistent um between jurisdictions, and so I think sometimes we lose uh criminalists in particular to other jurisdictions because they get paid roughly the same, but there's there's less work to do.

To expand on the chief's um answer there, uh Denver is is definitely more demanding.

Um you can go work in a in a suburban uh uh district or you know, um uh county and not have to work weekends, not have to work 24-7.

You might be on call, there might be you know a reduction in crime that you know you might only get called out once a month.

Here in Denver, our call volume is consistent, it's high, and it is more demanding for our criminalists.

Um there any like supports for the folks in these positions?

Um, do they have access to any of this?

Yes.

Yes, so we have a pretty robust uh wellness team, so and they don't just support as well as peer support, so they don't just support our sworn side but our professional staff side as well.

Pretty much anything that you've heard the chief talk about in the past about swarm wellness, those are all available to all of our um our professional staff as well, and highly utilized, I would say too.

And as far as like the technology and the like access to the equipment that they need, do you do you think that we have like that kind of access to the equipment that they need in order to do their jobs?

Yeah, I don't, I mean, uh obviously you know, but it's a challenge every year, but um I think we have all the critical equipment that they need to do their jobs.

All right.

Um well, thank you again.

I don't think I have any other specific questions right now.

Um, but fun fact, I actually was going to go into forensic science at one point in time in my life.

Actually, forensic pathologists, which is like a way all the way on the other end.

But no, this is um I'm I it's great to get this information.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Sure.

Uh Council President.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair, and thank you for the presentation.

Um it kind of relates to what you just said.

I keep I hear about young people like I'm in Florence Science, or I'm going into I want to work in a crime lab, and and you hear about that, but is the are the positions like transfer positions you've been, you know, um in a different safety position, you move into the crime lab, or are you looking for specific skills and talents, or do people go there and move on?

I'm just wondering where this fits in the it is a uh something that's a lot of interest to the community.

Um and so I know that the lab does do community tours and things, especially with people that are interested in getting into it.

Um there is a, and I'll go back, I don't know if it'll show on here, but um if I go back to sort of our structure within the crime lab, um we do have what we call forensic laboratory technicians, it's kind of an entry-level role.

You don't need a ton of experience, you might just need a bachelor's degree to get that opportunity.

Um, and then there's a career sort of succession or or or you know, you can kind of move up the ranks as we go, so then then the forensic scientist staff, which is our junior level scientist, they're you know, handling a lot of casework, but also with some oversight from more senior staff, and then they go to the associate, the um you do have seniors on here, oh yeah, forensic science and seniors towards the bottom there, and then uh up into management.

So there is kind of a career progression that that we provide here at at our crime lab.

Um, and we are pretty unique in this area of the country that we are one of the biggest labs um and we are able to provide such good career progression.

I think that's why we don't see as much attrition on the forensic scientist side, um, because uh it's a home where people can grow and they have that that opportunity there.

It is a very competitive field, um, and often when we are hiring, uh we do get applicants from all over the country.

Um so I would say that this is a very HR director thing, but networking is the best way for people to get into this career profession.

It's is a small close-knit community.

So going to networking events, getting to meet people, um, introducing yourself at those places, going on the tour that our crime lab provides, I think are all great opportunities for people to get involved with the community and find their next opportunity.

Thank you.

So then the I think the one of the first slides that you showed was where you were at your lowest staffing.

I think it was maybe 60% ish.

In the records unit?

Yeah, in the records unit.

So records still under the crime lab, different work, maybe not as compelling.

So the records unit is not part of the crime lab.

Okay.

Um the crime lab is part of the forensics and evidence division.

Um records is a separate bureau that rolls up into the chief's admin division.

I don't know if you want to speak more about structure.

Uh I I apologize for the confusion, but really we just you know, I think I think that we were asked to talk about our staffing challenges in the crime lab.

But we actually have greater staffing challenges in some of these other critical units like records ID.

And so I think we just wanted to provide an understanding of how equally critical these positions are, and how you know there's really this sort of delicate sort of um game, if you will, that I that I have to play as we manage the the budget throughout the year, and the one thing that I cannot control is overtime.

And so as we project over time throughout the year, and I understand that I might be over and over time there are allowances that have to be made, and sometimes those allowances have to be made in what uh positions I can hire for.

And so, you know, David and I have a regular meeting um monthly to talk about vacancies and then which vacancies are most critical to fill, and what you know what what will my budget allow me to do given the you know the the massaging that I have to do relative to the overtime increases and things like that that are that are more difficult to control.

Got it.

Um so does that mean just then for uh the records, for example, the one that you just gave the example of, not having it fully staffed, what is that impact then?

Well it impacts a lot.

I mean it it impacts it impacts um the the time officers have to wait for clearances and the time that the court has to wait for documents, um, the the time that the that the jail has to wait in order to process things, and so you know, um yeah, I I tend to keep a pretty good eye on when we're at critical mass and and you know when we just absolutely need to fill a position, and so you know it's more likely, you know, as you as you can see we're at um you know 60 percent, whereas in the crime lab we're in 80 or some percent.

And so the next opportunity that I have to hire is more likely that I'm gonna hire there because the the needs are critical, the the workload is is heavier there.

Um so it's also just another question too.

That then do I don't know if I ever would have been like, oh, I know to be a records person at you know in the safety department, like where do you recruit people from and and is that part of it is the pipeline for recruitment?

Or are there is there a line of people waiting to do the job, just not the funds to hire them?

Um I think that there are more and there are less glamorous positions, as we've talked about today, like forensic science is a little more glamorous.

We see it more on the true crime uh kind of documentaries on Netflix and things.

Um, you know, data entry is not the most glamorous career path for people out there, and I think particularly um data entry where there's such a demanding uh strictness around, I mean, the the work that the records community does, if they mess it up, somebody could be pulled out of their car at gunpoint because the you know, they didn't put in a stolen vehicle properly, and so they the the police officer out there on the on the street sees this vehicle, thinks it's stolen and pulls somebody outcoming.

That's a data entry issue that results in a community you know, member having something impact their life.

So we're not talking about somebody, you know, in a general data entry profession that makes a mistake that has that kind of thing happen.

So I think there's also a level of um data entry isn't the most glamorous job, and then the amount of expectations that we have to hold them to is really high.

And that isn't for everybody out there.

Um we're lucky that we do have a good recruiting team.

Um, and I would say that generally we're able to fill these positions relatively quickly, but it's not for everybody, and it takes a there's a uh a long um I'm gonna look over to Dan 14 weeks training program uh about uh to even get them ready to hit the floor and make these decisions.

This isn't something that that that is taken very lightly or that people can just jump into.

Um and it's not for everybody.

So we just do see attrition to that sort of academy training program that then requires us to go back out and fill positions.

So it's a challenge for us, but we work very closely to make sure we're we have a broad recruiting pool.

I think people are interested in working in the police department doing this work, but it's also not for everybody.

Not everybody can be that detail oriented in their work.

Um so those are some of the challenges that we face.

And and I would add to that that you know, our recruiting team is out every weekend, and uh mostly recruiting for police officers, but often they'll be contacted by individuals that will say, you know, I'm not interested in building a police officer, but I am interested in forensic work or uh something like that, and so we'll pass the information along to them so that they can get connected with David's team, and we actually have had um you know, as we've had people in our professional staff ranks that have decided to join the police academy, we've actually had uh police officers um decide that this is not quite for them and go on to records ID or something like that as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I don't have any other questions, thank you.

Okay, Mr.

Chairman.

Excuse me, I have a few before we do a second round.

Um just to confirm, all of these positions we're talking about, are they all civilian or are any of them sworn?

They're all what we would call professional staff, but they're non-sworn civilianals.

I remember when some of these, you know, 30 years ago might have been filled with sworn positions.

A few of them would have been and there are some positions that we could backfill with an officer, it would be you know terribly inefficient, ideal.

Um yeah, I mean, we're maybe somebody as an officer that is doing something, you know, of less survey.

Um, but there are some very technical roles that that you know, we just don't have the expertise to do it all.

Yeah, um the number of positions in each of the three areas that we looked at has been reduced, it's smaller than it was five years ago.

Is that because of greater efficiency, more digitizing, more efficient ways of fewer people doing the same amount of work, doing less with more, the famous uh phrase I always remember when they wanted to downsize people?

Uh or is it because of our budgetary problems?

So we're only authorized in the budget to have X number of positions.

So many of these um reductions were budget related.

Um, however, we have found greater efficiencies, and so um combination make correct.

Okay, it'd be hard to separate that out, I imagine, because most of them uh the reduction is coming in the last two years that are severe budget problems.

But uh, because you are budgeted for these total positions and you have a number of open ones, the number of open requisitions is small.

Why aren't we hiring for each of these open positions?

Are you being told by DOF department of finance, sorry, um, that you can only hire these people right now?

Well, I mean, that this is a conversation that uh myself and HR and DOF have regularly.

Well, I mean, that this is a conversation that uh myself and HR and DOF have regularly, um, understanding what our annual budget is and that number that we need to come into with the end of the year, understanding that we're not going to be able to apply for a supplemental this year because of the city's uh budgetary challenges, and so um that may mean that in order to account for overtime that that we're just not able to hire positions, but we want to make sure that we hire those that are absolutely critical, um, but those that are really just maybe lessening workload for for others, you know, um that might be a sacrifice that we have to make in order to meet our our budget requirements.

Okay, there's a battle, there's a point where overtime costs would compel one to look at higher an additional position to cover that, correct?

So how does that process go?

Because I see the number of requisitions that you have open right now is pretty small.

Well, like I said, I mean, um David and I and uh Shine Cummings are our our finance director, we meet probably weekly to talk about where we are, you know, and as far as our our budget is concerned and what the projections are, you know, or we'll predict it to be at the end of the year, and so um when we feel as though we are able to make uh hires, we we do, and when we feel like um there's some some budget sacrifices that we have to make that we do that.

All right, thank you.

Um councilwoman consultants guitarist.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, and thank you for some of the questions that you're asking because it's kind of along the same line of things.

Um you have the 16 vacant positions.

This is for the crime lab, right?

16 vacant positions, but you're seeking to fill two of them.

So the rest are kind of being held, and I just want to make sure I heard correctly that part of this is the concern or being able to hold those positions because of anticipated overtime that may be needed for the uniformed officers.

Is that it's not even anticipated overtime, it's overtime that has already been spent.

And if if we project forward, yeah, that tells us where we would likely end if we continued on the same path, which you know causes us to have to make some decisions throughout the year.

Okay.

And I'm the reason I'm asking that because last year we had a contingency request for 11 million dollars, right, for for that overtime pay.

And so I guess part of it is is that then is this an attempt to not have to then come back to to dip into contingency for that overtime paid?

Well, certainly.

Um I mean, I will say that we're 40% down in overtime period, but I mean, again, overtime, you know, when people work extra hours um or when there is uh a call out or something like that, I mean, that's overtime obligated to pay.

And so you know, we we track that and we create projections to determine where we would end up at the end of the year, you know, on that same pace, and so that is how that's what informs the staffing decisions that we have to make.

Okay, thank you for that.

Um question about implications for turnaround time on like investigatory needs, so like processing the um evidence that's being collected by the criminalists, um, and then it getting processed in the lab.

Are you all seeing an impact on that turnaround time in getting things processed?

Generally no.

So I think if you went back to the slide that broke down the positions, the the the positions, I mean most of our most of our um lab tech positions are filled.

Those are the people that are doing the testing.

The position that is the shortest are those crime scene investigators, and so and that's another area where we can, you know, uh inefficient, certainly, but we we could use officers to do evidence collection and things like that.

So you're using so uniformed officers are doing that that evidence.

In some cases, yes.

Or there's just a uh delay in sending out um you know text uh to to recover evidence.

Okay.

Um and I guess the last thing is just an ask.

Can you would you be able to provide us if you don't have it today?

Is it what how much how much has already been paid out in overtime for the department and kind of across the board how much has already been paid out since you said that's already happening?

Sure.

That would be great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

You're welcome.

Um any other members with questions?

Oh I guess we're anxious to get these folks back.

I chief, you might have a car to repair out of the or something.

I mean, do you pitch in on uh well seeing no other questions?

Uh I guess we can give you back almost an hour of your of your time.

I really appreciate this, Chief and David.

I think we have those four items on consent that are going forward, and with that we're adjourned.

Thank you.