Welcome to today's business session.

Our first item is approval of minutes for business session of June 9th.

Is there a motion to approve?

So move second.

Moved and seconded.

All in favor indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

The motion passes.

Although it was anyone opposed.

Motion passes.

Our first item is a KCPD presentation on violence prevention, certain issues with our entertainment districts.

I want to thank Captain Graves for helping us organize this in short order.

This was the subject of about an hour of discussion yesterday's Transportation Infrastructure and Operations Committee.

We recognize that it's worthwhile for the entirety of the city council.

Also recognize that we have Major Simons here today as well.

So gentlemen, take it away.

Good afternoon, Mayor, City Manager, City Council.

I guess Captain Graves is just letting me run with this.

I am.

I figured y'all just missed me and wanted me to come back for a session.

So we miss you.

So I understand and I apologize.

I didn't have a whole lot of time to prepare many notes as I've been in an all-day meeting yesterday and was supposed to be in one today, and I made most of it.

But so just as a discussion and entertainment plan, obviously, any time that we're looking at events that are going on throughout the city, the division station that I'm the commander of is Central Patrol Division, which houses most of the entertainment districts within Kansas City.

So on any given weekend, uh sometimes any given night, we have a lot of events going on.

Oftentimes we depend on security and off duty to assist with those events and to take that load off of on duty resources for them to be able to respond.

So we also know that they can't cover everything, and you know, there's events that come up last minute that weren't known about, or there's a type of disturbance that is just a little bit more than they can handle.

Um so during the summer months, we have an enter what we call an entertainment plan that we will implement.

Um so it lasts about half the year.

It's anywhere from 24 to 26 weekends a year.

Uh generally it starts April, May, just kind of dependent on the weather, how quick it warms up, and we usually wrap up sometime in October.

Again, some of that's dependent on the weather when it starts cooling down, and we start seeing the clock the crowds dwindle at the different locations.

Within that entertainment district plan, it is generally Fridays and Saturday nights because that's when we see the most activity occurring.

Um and again, I go back, we monitor the different events that are scheduled throughout the city, um, what's happening at the different districts and try to plan around those.

Um, this is why permitting and around events is critical and timely because that helps us make adjustments.

In fact, I'm dealing with one now that uh I'm scrambling to find some people.

Um, and so that is cumbersome for us to address those issues, and so I have to make staffing adjustments, and just like any other organization, we make plan scheduling staffing for those activities and what we anticipate.

But we'll look at those and um so depending on again, depending on the events we make adjustments.

Typically, our three main areas that we concentrate on.

There's uh actually kind of four.

They're the Power and Light, 18th and Vine Jazz District, um, Westport, and the plaza.

Um we'll have the staffing for this squad consists of three squads, um, one of our traffic squads, one of our tax squads, and our impact squad.

Each of those squads is made up of one sergeant.

Uh, if they're fully staffed, it's six officers, but they have to have at least five officers that are staffed.

So that's uh complement of eight fifteen, eighteen officers, three sergeants, and then we also have a commander that is overseeing all those units and monitoring all the areas throughout the night, and you know, depending on the weekend, I give them further direction if there's some extra events so they're aware of them so they can be monitored.

Um so they kind of start out the night.

Um, we'll have a roll call with all the officers where they can cover some of the concerns or extra events.

Um we kind of bounce around from different locations.

We'll start off at the plaza because generally if there's any issues, it's earlier in the evening.

Um, and a lot of times those are wrapped up in the you know, nine, ten, eleven o'clock, it just depends.

And then we kind of break off each unit to a different district.

That way there's extra on duty at all the areas to monitor those activities.

Um so they'll monitor those, uh, deal with any issues that are coming up, and if we have an incident or something that comes up where we may need a little additional staffing at a certain area, that's where that commander comes in and makes those adjustments, and he may say, Hey, I need a couple officers from this group.

Let's go over here and we'll go address this issue, or we'll add some extra staffing just because we see a larger crowd in this area, and we just want to have that increased presence.

Um typically by the end of the night, um, most of the venues in 18th and Vine Jazz district close by 1 30, so that's starting to calm down, and if there's no issues, we'll reallocate those officers, and typically they go down to Westport because that's where all our 3 AM bars are, and that's where we start seeing our crowds starting to congregate a little bit more in there in that area.

Um, and then same with our traffic, and they kind of help come down there with traffic and we'll end up down there.

Um it's kind of a quick, very overview.

Uh, it's a very fluid plan that we make adjustments going into the weekend, depending on what's going on, and then kind of as the night goes on, uh, it's very fluid.

And it's possible that we could have an area that had an event that needed some extra resources that we weren't aware of, and we may send some officers over there.

Uh, it could be that um I don't like naming particular venues, but something happens up north, and we'll send a contention of officers up there to help because there may be an area, and it's typically always entertainment geared, is where we may see some of those that come up, and we'll send a contention of officers there.