Good afternoon.

The time is now 2 p.m.

on Tuesday, August 19th, 2025, and the City of San Antonio budget work session is called to order.

Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Councilmember Corps.

Councilmember Castillo Angiano.

Councilmember Viagran.

Here.

Councilmember Mungia.

Present.

Councilmember Castillo.

Here.

Councilmember Galvan.

Councilmember Adarete Gavito.

Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez.

Present.

Councilmember Spears.

Councilmember White.

Here.

Ma'am, we have a quorum.

Great.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

All right.

So this meeting is to hear about budgets for the fire and police departments and the municipal court.

I think it's appropriate as we talked about our priority budgets.

The first the three things that we have to do our guiding principles, which is one, fund our no-fail missions, make sure that those have the those that are keeping us safe have the resources to do that, fire police, EMS.

Make sure we are minimizing any impacts to our most vulnerable and make sure that any changes in our budget, we minimize any long-term risks in our approach.

So Eric, are you ready to begin the staff presentations?

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council.

We'll start off with Chief Rostow transition to Chief McManus helping a portion of Chief McMahon's presentation will be Maria Vargas and Jesse Higgins from Metro Health.

And then we'll round out with Judge Obledow and Fred Garcia from municipal courts.

Chief.

To start, next slide, please.

I will be covering a few topics today.

We will be reviewing the staffing, the resources, the equipment, some of our capabilities, and the proposed budget for next year, as well as the initiatives and capital projects.

So I'd like to start off by introducing my new command staff, which consists of three deputy chiefs.

There's also six assistant chiefs.

Deputy Chief Christopher Monister oversees the administrative services division, and uh Deputy Chief Brandon Murray oversees emergency services and all of operations, which includes fire, EMS, as well as MIH.

In the center, uh the picture is Deputy Chief Brian O'Neill, who oversees support services.

He is also our emergency management coordinator overseeing the the city's uh emergency operations center.

Together, this leadership team is actively engaged on a daily basis with every division of the department, and like me, they're committed to maintaining effective services and excellent customer service.

So next we have the department overview, and as you'll see, we'll we have close to 1,900 uniformed employees supported by 129 civilian employees, and this slide provides a good snapshot of everything that makes our mission possible.

The majority of our staff operates out of 54 fire stations, and we maintain our own fleet in a constant state of readiness, and we also have specialized teams such as the aircraft rescue and firefighting, the tech rescue team, the Hazmat response team, and the wildfire response team as well.

Obviously, behind every response is a steady pipeline of well-trained men and women who are ready to step up and serve.

So here we take a look at the cadet classes and the paramedic training classes for fiscal year 2025.

We have two cadet classes that graduated for a combined total of 80 firefighters and two paramedic classes.

Next in uh fiscal year 2026, we are projecting two cadet classes with a combined total of 97 firefighters graduating and one EMS class of 20.

The current class is the 25 Alpha class, which has 45 cadets graduating in December.

And followed is the 25 Bravo class, which is going to have 52 cadets, and they will start the academy in January.

For 2027 fiscal year, we're projecting one cadet class and one EMS class.

And current vacancies, we have 39 uniforms at this time and 14 civilians.

Now let's take a look at the wide range of services that we deliver to the community every single day.

As you can see, we do a lot more than just fire and EMS.

We have paramedic dispatchers, we have our specialized teams that I just mentioned to you.

We also have the mobile integrated health care, as well as our fire prevention, which also encompasses the arson division, and they are responsible for permitting inspections and investigations.

The public outreach division also handles a large portion of our public education programs, and you know, all of us work together as a team protecting lives and serving our community.

So I'd like to brag a little about our ISO.

We we have a class one, and we are an accredited agency, and not many fire departments can say that they hold the ISO class one.

This is the insurance services office.

They evaluate fire departments nationwide on their ability to protect.

So there's a rating, the ratings range from class 10 to class one, and class one is the highest, reflecting top tier fire protection capabilities, and they really look at our staffing, training, equipment, water supply, and emergency communications.

We have maintained the ISO class one since 2017 and just recently renewed a few months back in 2025.

For the CFAI accreditation, that is a comprehensive peer reviewed process that compares us to other agencies, and that really evaluates our performance efficiency and continuous improvement efforts.

We have held this accreditation since 2019 and renewed in 2024.

So on this slide, you see the total number of in incidents, and that is broken down by medical and non-medical.

So as you can see, the medical calls make up the majority of our workload, and it always hovers around the 80-20 percentage, and those numbers are consistently high.

However, at the same time, we continue to respond to thousands of non-medical incidents, such as fires, rescues, hazmat, and other emergencies.

This supports the need to keep fire suppression and specialty teams fully prepared.

And it also shows that the current programs that we have in place, such as clinical dispatchers, MIH, the Good SAM app, are actually working.

So this effective response force slide will lead us into the next slide, which is our unit responses.

But this is especially important because the effective response force means that a major incident will usually require more than one unit to respond.

So, for instance, for a structure fire, as you can see for a house fire, we will deploy three engines, a ladder truck, a command vehicle, and for larger complex incidents, we have several other additional units that need to be dispatched to handle that emergency.

So obviously, different types of emergencies require a different number of people, vehicles, and units working together as a team.

So that leads us to our unit responses.

The unit responses show the workload on our people and apparatus.

One incident, as I mentioned, can generate several unit responses depending on the type of call.

So this next slide shows our response times and how we measure that performance.

So as you can see, the benchmark response time that we use is eight minutes, and this is a key measure of performance.

And this is a key measure of performance.

While call volumes and unit workload continue to increase, our performance remains steady, and we're running slightly higher than our goal.

We continually strive to reduce response times, and this year's budget initiatives will help us to maintain and enhance response times.

So this next slide is an overview of the general budget funding history, and it shows the budget over the past eight years of the general fund that is.

So in these, in this span of time, we have added 124 positions to the general fund.

And we could not have done that without your support.

That six-year trend brings us to this year's proposed budget.

So you can see the 443.6 million dollar proposed budget for fire fiscal year 2026.

And this chart breaks down the proposed budget by department program.

So as you can see exactly how those dollars are allocated across the department.

As you can see, fire and EMS take up the largest portions.

They are the largest programs at 47% and EMS at 23%.

Next you see the other, which encompasses a lot of other programs, such as emergency management, auxiliary support, communications, prevention, safety, training, MIH, SA core, fire investigation and arson, tech services, public outreach, and JBSA.

So our first initiative is the addition of two squad units and 12 uniformed positions.

Designed to reduce response times, they lighten the load the workload on frontline units, and they enhance service in high demand areas.

These smaller, more agile units are staffed with two people, and they handle the high frequency calls.

They reduce the wear and tear on our frontline engines and apparatus, and they also allow heavy apparatus to stay available for major emergencies and respond to the calls that they were designed to respond to.

They also reduce downtime and save money on repair and maintenance costs.

So we are proposing to house these two squads at station 10 and fire station 21.

And I'll show that on the on the next slide.

So the rationale behind the squad placement is this slide.

It shows the 10 busiest single company engines.

So focusing on the top six, four of those six already have a squad in place.

And those squads have proven to provide relief for frontline apparatus, and they've improved overall coverage in these high demand areas.

They have they had been our top two busiest stations for quite some time.

But once squads were added, there was a marked decrease in unit response.

Engines 19 and engine four received squads in July, and we expect to see the same results.

The mandated cost for fiscal year 2026.

These are the two that we will be facing next year, and they include the collective bargaining agreement, 8% wage increase, and the UT Health Science Center contract.

The UT Health Science Center provides critical medical direction and oversight to our EMS system to include training.

This is really to increase or to right size the base budget to cover the incremental annual increase.

On the next slide is our needs assessment.

And we are proposing a needs assessment to be completed and to focus on staffing equipment and facilities.

So it will be a very comprehensive, all-encompassing.

The assessment, the assessment provides a data-driven, objective look at our needs.

And we would like to identify gaps and develop a roadmap that ensures that we're prepared for the city's growth.

And I do realize this assessment, it requires significant funding at 1.4 million, but it does guarantee that we're planning smart, making good decisions, and preparing for growth because we really do want to continue to deliver the level of service that our community expects.

On the next slide, we will see the other initiative is to purchase drones for 291,000.

Staff has researched different drone platforms and applications.

They've studied FAA guidelines and developed a policy and training plan or the framework of that.

And this is the very first time the department has purchased drones for operational purposes.

So reductions for fiscal year 2026 include a overtime management at 1 million.

We've been working to better align staffing and scheduling so that we can operate more efficiently.

We've eliminated the civilian athletic trainer position and shifted that function to an outside contractor.

And it reached, and we're also proposing to restructure the recruit fitness conditioning program to provide the same opportunities at a lower cost.

And lastly, line item budgets have been right sized to match actual spending, creating savings without affecting core services.

And I'd like to reiterate that the reductions proposed have no impact to service.

The next slide covers infrastructure and the projects in progress.

As you can see, stations 52 and 53.

Currently they're in temporary station.

It's actually a mobile home.

So we're making we're working to make those permanent.

Also in progress is fire station 21, fire station 33, and fire station 10, all in various stages, but they are moving through the design build process.

So in closing, above all, this this budget and the proposals are uh they come down to to being ready and serving our community.

Um I know we work very hard to ensure that our department has the staffing, the equipment and the facilities to do their work, and we would like to continue to meet the needs and expectations of our community.

Thank you.

I'd like to hand it over to uh Chief McManus.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council.

Today I'm going to walk you through the key points that shape up our proposed budget.

I am going to start with a quick overview of the department and a number of metrics pertaining to our service delivery.

Our violent crime reduction strategy, crime stats, revenue enhancements, as well as reductions and efficiencies.

From there, I'll highlight the proposed budget for the coming fiscal year, breaking down where the dollars go.

We'll look at our major investments, both in people and in technology.

Because those are what allow us to keep or what allow us allows us to keep pace with the with the city's growth and keep our community safe.

Next, I'll talk about revenues, new revenues, and then finally, I'll walk through some of the reductions that we've made and how we're tightening up where we can without compromising public safety.

So that's the plan for today, an overview of where we stand and what we're proposing for 2026.

So this slide gives an overview of our policing staffing levels for the upcoming fiscal year, and these numbers represent the women and men dedicated to protecting the San Antonio day in and day out.

We'll have 2,0893 SAPD officers.

These are the frontline officers you see in patrol cars responding to calls and maintaining a visible presence in our neighborhoods.

SAPD is also supported by 141 park police officers, ensuring our parks and trails are safe for families.

44 aviation police officers keeping our airports secure.

992 civilian staff that are essential to keeping operations efficient and allowing officers to focus on policing.

Civilian staff play a huge role in keeping San Antonio safe.

Forty-two positions at the arresting processing center help with intake and reduce officer time tied up with paperwork.

262 school crossing officers or school crossing guards provide safety for the children to and from school, and six positions support our parks and airport operations.

And then finally, 683 civilian staff provide direct support to SAPD from communications, records to management.

Altogether, this staffing model ensures we balance frontline policing with civilian staff that keeps the department running smoothly.

Every one of these positions plays a part in protecting San Antonio.

At the top of the structure is the chief of police who provides overall leadership and strategic direction to our department.

The department is divided into three main bureaus operations bureau, operations support bureau, and the administrative services bureau, with each specialized responsibilities.

Operations bureau is headed by Assistant Chief Bobby Blanton.

Bobby, will you stand up?

This is the front line of public safety.

Patrol officers, traffic enforcement, park and airport police, and our safe officers who focused on community engagement.

They're also coordinate volunteer services, which help extend our reach into the neighborhoods.

This Bureau handles our more specialized investigations, including homicide, robbery, special victims, and narcotics units.

Rick.

Rick is our numbers guy.

Rick's Bureau provides the backbone of support that keeps the department running.

It includes communications, fleet services, records management, fiscal and contracts, and permit administration.

Civilian professional staff play a key role here, ensuring resources are managed effectively.

Beyond the bureaus, we have a citywide, we have citywide functions, training and recurring new training and recruiting new officers, community engagement, media and open records requests, professional standards, and our technology team.

These ensure the department maintains high standards, transparency, and modern capabilities.

This structure ensures that while one side of the department focuses on day-to-day public safety, others handle specialized investigations and the administrative support needed to keep the entire operation running smoothly.

This chart shows the difference between calls we receive and the ones where we actually dispatch an officer.

In 2024, we received over two million calls, about 1.8 million requiring dispatch.

By 2026, we're projecting call volume will rise again while dispatches stayed just about under 1.9 million.

So while total calls go up and down, the key takeaway is that not every call needs an officer response.

Many are resolved over the phone or involve multiple callers reporting the same incident.

Looking at our crime statistics, the department reports crimes to the FBI using the NIBERS reporting system.

Let's take a look at the overall crime picture.

So far in 2025.

The good news is that the total reported crime is down significantly from last year.

Total reported crimes from January through July dropped 15.1% compared to the same period in 2024.

Crimes against persons or violent crimes declined almost 9%.

Crimes against property saw the largest decrease down almost almost 20%.

And crimes against society, such as drug offenses, weapon offenses, and public order offenses rose about 11.5%.

And that's because officers are making more rest for crimes against society.

Violent crimes include assault, homicide, human trafficking, kidnapping, abduction, and sex offenses to name a few.

Crimes against property, arson, burglary, counterfeiting, forgery, embezzlement, extortion, fraud, larceny, motor vehicle theft, and robbery.

Crimes against society include animal cruelty, drug narcotic offenses, gambling, pornography, prostitution, and weapons law violations.

These are typically crimes that don't have a complainant.

In short, violent and property crimes are trending down, and officers are being proactive in addressing crimes against society.

The key points here are arrests are going up every year.

From 22 to 23, 2022 to 2023, over 48, 43,000 arrests.

23 to 24, over 45,000 arrests.

And in 24 and 25, almost 47,000 arrests.

Arrests have steadily increased each year, reflecting both proactive policing by all units, uniform and covert.

Looking at our call response times, let's take a look at the green bars, which are a which are the emergency response times, and we've seen small improvements since FY23, bringing times down to just under six minutes.

Looking ahead, we're projecting to hold steady around six minutes in fiscal year 2025.

The non-emergency response times are represented by the blue bars, and they have steadily improved over the by over 20 minutes from over 20 minutes in fiscal year 2022 to under 19 minutes today.

We estimate further improvement to just over 18 minutes by FY 2026.

This shows progress in getting officers to both urgent and non-urgent calls much more quickly.

These trends show steady progress in reducing wait times and keeping our community safer.

Looking at the budget, our police general fund budget has steadily grown to match the city's public safety needs.

Back in 2019, the budget was about 477 million.

It was up in 2023 to 555 million.

Last year we reached over just over 630 million.

This year's proposal is 655.8 million.

That's nearly a 40 percent increase since 2019.

This funds SAPD, Park Police, and the Arresting Processing Center.

Arrestee Processing Center.

These numbers reflect the following improvements since 2019, and there's a list of them.

We implemented a new records management system.

We opened up the St.

Mary's substation.

We implemented SA COR.

We added 25 domestic violence detectives, five academy classes, 24 added additional safe officers, technology improvements to include in-car video, body worn camera improvements, and a digital video management system.

Bottom line here, this budget reflects real investment in safety and in our officers.

And that increase isn't just numbers, it transfer it translates into staff entity safety.

Next, I'll show you the funding that this funding that supports our priorities on the ground.

This budget reflects our priorities in patrol, operations support, and emergency services.

$20 million for park police, $5 million for the arrestee processing center, $34 million in restricted funds, and that includes child safe, child safe funds or restricted funds from that come from vehicle register, $1.50 for each vehicle registration fee, $5 from each parking violation fee, and $25 from each moving violation fee.

Towing funds represent all towing fees and auction revenues and confiscated funds related to police investigations.

$12.8 million in grants.

Two cops grants, a JAG grant, Justice Administration Grant or JAG grant, the Regional Auto Crimes Task Force Grant or REEAT grant, and then the Texas Anti-Gang program grant or tag.

This budget supports a total of 4,070 positions.

Overall, this budget invests in both frontline patrol and administrative functions, and they are essential in keeping our city safe.

Our violent crime reduction strategy with UTSA is showing a lot of progress in its second year.

In 2023, SAPD partnered with UTSA to develop a violent crime reduction plan.

The plan consisted of three phases.

The first strategy is a hotspot policing, which I'm sure everybody's heard about, which calls for increased visibility in targeted areas.

The key results.

Since last year, violent crime incidents dropped nearly 10% citywide.

We saw significant reductions in aggravated assaults and deadly conduct and calls for service in our treatment areas were down more than 15%.

Good afternoon.

I'm Maria Vargas, the Director of Integrated Community Safety.

I'm here to first speak to you on the violent crime reduction strategy, phase two problem-oriented place-based policing, or POPB for short.

It began in 2024 and involves multi-departmental collaboration in developing and implementing solutions at a single location.

The location is one that continues to experience chronic violent crime despite hotspot phase one treatment.

The first site was the Rosemont Apartments at 1303 Rigsby Avenue.

Intensive city activity took place there from July to December of 2024.

This site had 252 units, and some key results was the connection of residents to services and the reduction in violent crime activity.

The second location was selected earlier this year.

It is the reserves at Pecon Valley at 4032 East South Cross Boulevard.

Intensive city activity began in June of 2025.

This location has 357 habitable units.

And I'd like to note that at this time, code enforcement has issued 41 notices to the property owner with a compliance deadline of September 10th, 2025, and a reinspection date set for September 11th, 2025.

I'd like to take this opportunity to speak to you about the Good Neighbor program, which shares many key features with POPB, hence its inclusion in the presentation at this time.

Good neighbor began in FY 2024, and like POPB, it coordinates efforts between city departments to address problems at a single location.

In contrast to POPB, which is thus far focused on apartment complexes exhibiting violent chronic violence calls for service and issues.

Good neighbor focuses on single family resident properties that exhibit chronic nuisance costs for service and issues.

These properties are identified through the analysis of police and fire call for service data from 911 and non-emergency lines and also from 311 call for service data.

The goal here is to connect residents to services and to implement enforcement as appropriate to achieve compliance.

Currently, in order for our property to be considered for the good neighbor program, it has to experience 12 or more calls for service within a three-month period.

At this time, the ICSO is looking to carry 25 active properties in this program at any given moment.

As a result, data is refreshed every month in order to backfill these properties as needed to achieve that 25 minimum.

Once properties are identified as having achieved 12 or more calls for service, they are then prioritized using the Good Neighbor Index, which is an algorithm that takes into consideration the call types, the outcomes of those calls, and other conditions in addition to call volume.

An example of another condition would be the presence of a dog registered on the dangerous dog registry.

Once a property has moved forward into consideration for active, the ICSO attempts to make contact, an SAPD safe conducts an assessment, and then a multidisciplinary working group creates and implements a plan of action to address the issues at the at those properties.

On the right hand side, you can see the current distribution of good neighbor properties amongst the program statuses.

And you can also see the distribution of those properties across these city council districts.

Returning to the violent crime reduction strategy, phase three focused deterrence is anticipated to begin in 2026, and that is calendar year 2026.

It involves multi-agency collaboration to identify and engage with identified violent offenders within the community who are at high risk of recidivism.

It will involve the combination of law enforcement intervention and supportive social services to reduce repeat offending and violence.

At this time, I'd like to hand the presentation to Jesse Higgins from Metro Health.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Maria, and thank you to Chief McManus and Chief Frosto for allowing me to present on SA CORE.

Good afternoon, Mayor and City Council members.

I'm Jesse Higgins, I'm the chief mental health officer for the city.

I have the privilege of collaborating with the police department, the fire department, the Southwest Texas Regional Advisory Council or STRAC, and the Center for Health Care Services or CHCS on this program, SA Core.

The San Antonio Community Outreach and Resiliency effort started in April of 2022 and has gone from a program that was only an SAPD central substation to expanding to three teams that cover the city 24 7.

This program serves to respond to 911 mental health calls, reduce unnecessary arrests by routing people to the correct level of care, and increase outpatient services through follow-up clinicians.

So far this fiscal year through the end of July, the team was dispatched to 4,486 calls.

1,114 of them were resolved on scene because the team was able to de-escalate the crisis and refer to follow-up clinicians.

1,09 of them were emergency detained by the police officer to a hospital because they were an immediate harm to themselves or others, or were so decompensated that they were not able to safely take care of themselves.

543 were transported by the team either to a behavioral health hospital voluntarily, an outpatient clinic to take care of a social need, or by EMS to a hospital to take care of a physical health need.

Only one person has been arrested through this program.

990 fell into another category where the team was unable to locate the individual or the team assisted other units, and 829 were canceled in route when another unit addressed the call first.

Of these 4,486 responses, the ones that are emergency detained, resolved on scene, transported somewhere, resolved by phone, or assisted on were referred to follow-up.

And 2,303 of those individuals engaged with the follow-up clinician in some way.

These follow-up clinicians engage people at 24 hours, 7 days, 14 days, 30 days, 60 days, and 90 days.

Thank you so much for allowing me to highlight this excellent work of the team.

It's truly an honor to get to hear their successes in the way that they are able to engage people into life-saving treatment.

Thank you, Jesse.

And Maria.

We're continuing to make progress toward our long-term staffing target with the addition of 25 new police officers this year.

So some key points I'll go over.

Our overall goal is to add 360 police officers over the next three to five years.

In FY24, we added 100, followed by 65 more in FY25.

The staffing goal is designed so patrol officers can spend 60% of their time on proactive policing and 40% of their time responding to calls.

Back in 2023, proactive policing time was only 41%.

But by FY 2025, it has increased to 49%.

And what is directed patrol or what is proactive policing?

Some examples are directed patrol, traffic enforcement, community engagement, and quality of life neighborhood concerns.

This ultimately gives all patrol officers the opportunity to function in a similar manner, such as the safe officers do.

This investment continues to move us closer to our goal of a more proactive community focused presence in the community.

Next, I'd like to highlight a major investment in public safety infrastructure, the South Florida's police department, police station.

So it was funded through the 2022 bond program at 21.6 million.

It's located at South Florida's in Roosevelt, strategically placed due to the growth we see in that area.

Council approval is set for October 2025 with groundbreaking in spring of 2026.

We're targeting an opening in 2027.

This facility will add 28 sworn supervisory positions in FY2025 and seven civilian positions in FY2027.

The substation represents a long-term commitment to safer neighborhoods and stronger community police partnerships.

Another step we're taking to enhance public safety is absorbing park and airport police under SAPD as vacancies occur.

We're transitioning 65 positions into SAPD, 52 from park police, and 13 from airport police.

This broadens the scope of service we can provide to the community, covering parks and the airport.

And most importantly, it strengthens public safety for everyone in San Antonio.

I mentioned earlier that there are two current cops grants that we currently have.

Mandated costs included a 4% wage increase in the CBA and the City Match for the COPS grants that I just mentioned and the contract increases with Axon Mark 43 for our RMS and our medical medical care at the arrestee processing center.

SAPD.

Thanks.

SAP and ITS and ITSD are not just keeping up with technology.

We're exploring cutting-edge tools that make our operations more efficient and more effective.

We're testing new digital forensics platforms to strengthen investigations and threat assessments.

We're exploring AI-powered video analytics to help supervisors quickly review body worn camera footage.

And to save officer time, we're looking at automated report writing tools that prepare draft reports for officers.

These emergency technologies are about one thing, helping officers spend less time on paperwork and more time protecting our community.

Let me talk about some revenue enhancements that we're looking at.

We're proposing updated alarm permit fees to align more with state law.

The largest revenue driver is the commercial alarm renewal permit, projected at over 1.4 million.

New and renewal residential permits are modest increases capped at $50 under the state law.

The unpermitted commercial robbery fee would double to $500.

The off-duty surcharge has yet hasn't been updated in years, so we propose raising it from $1.50 to $10 per officer per hour.

The single change generates over 210,000 in added revenue.

The last time we increased fees for alarms was in 2010.

Unpitted commercial, unpermitted commercial robbery.

And these modest adjustments stay within state law and add significant revenue without creating new taxes.

Next, I'd like to highlight some of our reductions in efficiencies that we've identified to save costs while maintaining service levels.

Over FY24 and FY25, authorized positions to patrol has improved our staffing levels.

As we continue to train and graduate the 65 positions that were added in FY25, we expect to see a reduction in overtime expenditures.

We're realigning shift hours, which will allow us to close the gap between the afternoon and the overnight shift.

Our current shift structure results in an hour gap between 9 30 and 10 30 p.m.

By restructuring the shifts to remove the gap, we will achieve greater efficiency and reduce costs as well.

This ensures consistent service while lowering costs.

Two administrative support positions in sworn and sworn units will be absorbed by existing by existing staff.

One administrative position in the chief's office will be consolidated into the remaining positions with no service impact.

Two program specialist positions in the off-duty employment unit will shift to sworn personnel with billing handled by the civilian accountant.

Excuse me one second, while I'll take a drink here.

Two administrative support positions in sworn units will be absorbed by existing staff.

One administrative position in the chief's office will be consolidated into the remaining positions with no service impact.

Two program specialist positions in the off-duty employment unit will shift to sworn personnel with billing handled by civilian the civilian accountants.

And one civilian public engagement position will be reassigned again with no impact on services.

And lastly, we are moving three million dollars, three million in expenses to the capital budget, a portion of which will be used for cloud storage.

These changes streamline our workforce, reduce expenses, and still allow for us to deliver the same level of service to our community.

And in summary, let me close with a quick summary of where we stand and what we're working toward as a department.

So adding more officers is critical.

It allows us to reach our goal of having officers spend 60% of their time on proactive patrol instead of being tied up on calls, and that has a lot of collateral impact, positive collateral impact.

We continue to use evidence-based strategies and proven practices to help our officers improve public safety and overall quality of life.

Our recruiting and cadet training efforts remain strong, ensuring a steady pipeline of qualified officers.

And importantly, SAPD remains a full service department, ready to respond to every type of call that the city faces, unlike many other cities throughout the country.

With these efforts combined, we're not just keeping up with city needs, we're preparing for the future of public safety in San Antonio San Antonio.

And I'd like to turn this over to Eric right now.

Chief, go to the next slide, please.

So uh several of you asked uh last week at the budget work session about uh uh possibly what the cost was of adding an additional 40 officers uh along with the 25 patrol officers for a total of 65, and we wanted to provide this in today's presentation.

The FY26 cost would be an additional $2.1 million dollars, and the second year cost of those 40 positions at $5.9 million.

So we wanted to provide that at the at the request that you all had on Thursday.

Judge Good afternoon.

My name is Carl Bletho.

I am the presiding judge of the San Antonio Municipal Court.

I, along with Fred Garcia, our municipal court clerk, are pleased to present municipal court's fiscal year 2026 proposed budget.

The San Antonio Municipal Court is a court of record and operates as the judicial branch for the City of San Antonio.

The court has jurisdiction over Class C fine-only misdemeanors under that are created under state law or city ordinance.

Some examples include traffic violations, theft of under $100, public intoxication, and cruelty to animal violations.

Class C misdemeanors make up most criminal offenses in Texas, and more Texans will visit a municipal court in their lifetime than any other than all other Texas courts combined.

In addition to the presiding judge, the court has 12 full-time judges and 11 part-time judges who are appointed by the mayor and city council for two-year terms.

Their duties and responsibilities are set forth in set forth by city ordinance, city charter, and the code of criminal procedure.

Municipal court clerk Fred Garcia oversees a support staff of 113 members, and while there is no statutory requirement that clerks and warrant officers be certified, the court requires state certification to increase competency and professionalism.

The court's mission statement, highlighted on the opening slide, emphasizes the four pillars of procedural justice, which are voice, neutrality, respect, and truth and uh voice neutral neutrality, trustworthiness, and respect.

Regardless of circumstances, every person we treat is treated with respect.

Every person we serve is treated with respect.

They are given an opportunity to have their voices heard before decisions are made.

The rule of law is applied consistently by municipal court judges who have taken an oath to administer justice with neutrality, impartiality, and fairness.

It is in these ways that municipal court prioritizes procedural justice in its daily operations.

For many individuals, interacting with the court system can be intimidating, often due to fears related to financial concerns, arrest, job loss, or even impacts on child custody.

These can free these concerns frequently can frequently discourage people from appearing in court.

However, when courts prioritize procedural justice, they foster trust within the community, reduce noncompliance, and encourage voluntary engagement with the legal system.

Municipal courts that apply these principles in daily operations, like the San Antonio Municipal Court can help create an environment where defendants feel empowered rather than trapped.

By law, courts are required to assess a defendant's ability to pay.

If a judge determined the defendant determines the defendant's income and resources are insufficient, she or he must determine whether various forms of discharge, such as community service, installment payments, waiver, or a combination are appropriate.

It should also be noted that Texas law prohibits incarcerating defendants solely for failure to pay fines.

While there is no statutory definition of indigence for municipal courts, judges have broad discretion in evaluating a defendant's financial circumstances.

This discretion, however, must be exercised within the bounds of due process, which requires judges to remain neutral and impartial when assessing punishment.

A judge denies a defendant due process when he or she arbitrarily refuses to consider the entire range of punishment or imposes a predetermined punishment or in exercising their judgment, judges must ensure that the factors considered and the weight assigned to them are guided by the canons of judicial conduct and reflect a careful individualized assessment of each case.

As we strive to provide individual justice for individual cases, a number of special specialty dockets have been created to address the specific needs of individuals that appear in court.

Among these dockets is this SA Road Ready Docket, which targets young adults charged with Texas driver license requirement violations.

It is designed to provide resources and facilitate a framework for young offenders to become licensed road ready drivers.

Community court is another specialty docket that is designed to address the specific needs of individuals charged with fine-only Class C misdemeanors who self-identify as unhoused, reside in a shelter, or lack permanent housing.

Community court partners with local shelters, service agencies, and other courts, as well as the second chance for success program due to the Bear County District Attorney's Office to identify and support individuals charged not only with Class C misdemeanors but also higher level offenses.

These specialty dockets give judges an opportunity to engage more meaningfully with defendants while still holding them accountable.

By employing creative sentencing options, judges may order community service, require participation in aggressive driving classes, mandate completion of the reality education for drivers program, or even set GED attainment as a condition.

In addition to a daily walk-in docket, other dockets not listed include DPS, quality of life, minor in possession, expunction, and a docket to address commercial motor vehicle violations.

There we go.

These bars represent the number of individuals placed on deferred disposition or probation for Class C family violence offenses.

And the number in green represent the number of individuals that successfully completed their terms of probation.

These types of cases encompass a range of complex situations involving two types of charges: assault by contact and assault by threat.

The probation terms for these types of offense usually reflect the seriousness of the offense and the desire and are designed to hold the offender accountable and protect the victim.

The probation term is typically an unsupervised period that extends for approximately 150 days, and depending on the specifics of the case, conditions can include mandatory counseling, anger management classes, mental health services, and substance abuse treatment.

The court regularly meets with ACS and city prosecutors to ensure timely case hearings.

Despite our different roles, we share a commitment to public safety, holding pet owners accountable, and also educating the community on responsible pet ownership.

When appropriate, the judge orders responsible pet owner classes and individuals have been ordered to perform community service hours at ACS.

As you can see from the table on the far right, most of the criminal cases filed at the court are filed as criminal cases.

And due to this increase, additional dockets have been created to ensure that defendants' cases are heard timely.

I also want to point out that on the table at the top, that does not include every disposition for these types of offenses.

For instance, it would just be too lengthy if we included them all.

So resets aren't included, cases that are set for trial are not included, individuals that are currently on probation ordered to do community service hours, those are not listed on that table.

In addition to criminal code violations, the court handles administrative adjudication hearings related to animal care, public safety, fire safety, and building maintenance and appearance.

The court's primary focus is fostering compliance, contributing to clean, secure, and livable neighborhoods.

Because cases are can be resolved more quickly, the majority of code violations are filed civilly.

The court serves juveniles aged 10 to 16 who are referred for fine-only traffic and non-traffic offenses.

Using a restorative approach, it emphasizes education, accountability, and community safety while helping eligible youth maintain a clean record.

Juveniles must appear in person with a parent or guardian when summoned.

Through juvenile case managers, the court tailor support programs such as youth diversion, teen court, youth enrichment classes, which 371 youth youths participated in this last fiscal fiscal year, community service and counseling, and partnership with UTSA Mental Health Counseling Department.

Students and parents, 242 students and parents and guardians have received services through the UTSA Mental Health Department.

Additionally, the court supports Bear County schools in addressing student attendance through the truancy prevention and intervention program for students age four to 19.

Juvenile case management juvenile case managers partner with 11 school districts and four charter school programs to address school attendance issues.

Interventions include school-sponsored forums, individualized diversion agreements, and court-ordered mediations.

Other specialized interventions include transition dockets, which support incoming sixth and ninth graders adjusting to new expectations, re-engagement dockets, which provides outreach to students who have withdrawn or fallen behind academically, and senior summits, which provide support for at-risk high school seniors with attendance concerns.

The court hosted senior summits last fiscal year in the fall and in the spring.

While we're still waiting on our fall numbers, 92% of the high school seniors that attended the spring summit graduated from high school.

So we're trying to keep up that momentum.

Attendance matters is a parent-focused class which focuses on the importance of school attendance.

So 189 parents have successfully completed that program.

Teen Court is another court-led initiative in partnership with St.

Mary's University School of Law students and prosecutors from the City Attorney's Office.

Student volunteers adjudicate cases assigning constructive sentences such as community service, apology letters, and counseling.

Under the Texas Youth Diversion and Early Intervention Act, which began January 1st, 2025, youth accused of certain class C misdemeanors must be diverted from formal prosecution.

The new law emphasizes accountability and rehabilitation without imposing fines or unrelated punitive measures.

In Texas, all judges are magistrates, serving as magistrates, municipal court judges make probable cause determinations for all misdemeanor and felony offenses involving individuals arrested by SAPD, park police, airport police, and DPS.

If probable cause is established, the magistrate informs the accused of the charges against them and their rights, including the right to remain silent, to retain counsel, to terminate an interview at any time, and to have an attorney present during questioning pursuant to Article 15.17 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure.

Arrestees who are committed to jail are transported with complete case files, including the commitment orders, statutory warnings, police reports, any additional orders, and their inventory property.

The only legal requirement left is to set bail.

And in addition to the writs listed on the chart at the bottom.

Other magistrate responsibilities include admonishing juveniles of their rights before providing a statement to law enforcement, issuing orders of emergency detention, issuing animal seizure warrants, issuing search warrants involving city code violations, and processing class C arrests.

And before I turn it over to Fred de Garcia, I want to mention that the court participates in a number of community engagement activities.

And while I don't have enough time to cover every activity today, you will be receiving a community engagement booklet for fiscal year 25 that highlights the court's efforts.

Everything Fred and I share with you today is a direct result of their dedication and hard work.

They consistently rise to the challenge of finding creative ways to strengthen public safety, encourage school attendance, and educate our community on the importance of safe, clean neighborhoods, and they are what make the San Antonio Municipal Court the best court in Texas.

Thank you.

Thank you, Judge Obleto.

My name is uh uh good afternoon, Mayor Jones, members of City Council and City Manager.

My name is Fred Garcia, I'm your municipal court clerk.

Thank you for this opportunity to um present to you the proposed fiscal year 26 budget and highlight the services we provide.

This slide shows our current general fund budget history or the past seven years and our proposed fiscal year 26 general fund budget.

The general fund decrease with fiscal year 25, 14.1 million dollars to fiscal year 26 proposed 13.9, is mainly due to an ITSD assessment fee reduction.

Our fiscal year 26 proposed budget authorizes 16.8 million dollars and 141 employee positions.

Our funding comes from three main sources with the city's general fund as its largest component.

The second source is from the 14 local consolidated court fee assessed on traffic, criminal and city code cases.

This feed is divided into the following three restricted funds.

The municipal court truancy intervention and prevention fund, which supports the salaries and benefits of our juvenile case managers and the juvenile services division.

The Bistell Court Building Security Fund supports the salaries and benefits of our bailiffs, as well as our other courthouse security needs.

And finally, the Missile Court Technology Fund helps support our case management system and related technology needs.

The final funding source for our budget is from the juvenile justice insurancy prevention grant of the Office of the Governor, which provides salaries, benefits, and training for our juvenile case managers who work closely with local school districts to address truancy through early intervention and prevention.

The accompanying pie chart highlights the court's major program areas, showing how staffing and expenditures are distributed to provide essential services to our court users.

Our largest program is operations and includes most of our public-facing staff.

They assist court users daily, managing case workflow and ensure accurate, timely, and complete records.

The court judiciary and case adjudication program includes our full-time judges whom our residents appeared before to resolve their cases and who make impartial rulings based on the law.

It also encompasses our administrative hearing officers who hear parking, civil code, and civil ACS cases.

The truancy prevention and intervention program covers our juvenile services division and juvenile case managers.

The administrative and support program supports the Office of the Court Clerk, fiscal staff, and provides operational planning, strategic support, and performance management to ensure the court has the resources needed to maintain continuity of services.

The magistration program encompasses our 24-7 magistrates and court staff supporting the public, law enforcement, and court personnel through the magistration process.

And finally, the municipal court security program includes our bailiffs who maintain courtroom order and security while ensuring court proceedings run smoothly.

It also funds additional measures and equipment to protect both the staff and the public.

Case filings across traffic, non-traffic, and civil code violations have continued an upward trend over the past three fiscal years.

While parking offenses are slightly lower compared to fiscal year 24, non-traffic criminal cases have increased.

The graphs on the left side of the slide shows the daily work of our staff helping court users resolve their cases.

In-person services includes court appearances, mail processing, and other direct communications.

Remote services include text messages, online chats, phone calls, emails, kiosks, and online dispute resolution.

Text messaging has quickly become one of our most effective tools.

It has helped us to improve appearance rates at hearings and trials.

In the past year, we sent thousands of reminders and updates, saving time and resources while keeping people informed.

We've also seen a major shift towards online services.

Usage increase 88% from last year to this year.

More people are requesting driver safety courses, payment plans, community service, and even trial settings online.

The graphs on the right side of the slide also depicts the change the change in our payments.

Online payments continue to grow while in-person payments are trending down.

The shift tells us our community values convenience and we're committed to keep the court accessible in ways that meet people where they are.

Stopping standing and parking offenses are authorized as civil violations under the Texas Transportation Code and Chapter 19 of the City Code.

Analysis indicates a $20 adjustment to the top 10 violations may be feasible.

It's important to note that fines for these violations have not been adjusted by City Council since 2009 and currently remain below those assessed in other major Texas cities.

In 2009, City Council authorized fines up to the statutory maximum of $500, inclusive of all fines, fees, and costs for stopping standing and parking offenses.

Mayor Jones, members of City Council and City Manager.

This concludes our presentation.

And especially for those acknowledging the staff, the team that's here today that helped prepare it for this presentation.

Judge Obleto and I would like be glad to answer any questions you may have about municipal court.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Would you like to make any remarks after each of those?

No.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Well, thank you, Chiefs, for the presentation.

Thank you, Judge, to your team for also the very helpful presentation.

Thanks again to the uh staff, all the hard work that went into making today possible.

Um Chief Frosto.

Um as each of the council members are trying to understand kind of the impacts in their immediate areas.

Would you by chance have a breakdown of of the medical largely as 80% medical incidents?

Would you by chance have a breakdown of the medical incidents by age and by issue so we can understand what that looks like geographically?

I think I yeah, I understand the the needs assessment is is going to be helpful, but I think we'd like to understand kind of what it looks like now.

I think many of us are again are quite concerned about uh what's going to happen within our community, especially those on fixed income, uh those already that are under uh medically underserved, medically uninsured, uh so to understand kind of where we are now and where we we may see additional challenges in the near term will be helpful, especially as we look at uh your budget request and in that context.

Yes, ma'am.

I do have the the top five medical calls for fiscal year 2024.

I do not have a complete list.

Yeah, is that I think something that would help?

Yes, ma'am, thank you.

Yeah, thank you, Chief.

Um and I think as we try to look at this again from a a little bit more strategic and more data driven, you know, the inner um the the collaboration between um again where we understand those folks that are medically underserved, medically uninsured, and how that actually contributes to a higher rate of need for your services as we try to do some of this longer term planning, that level of analysis, data driven analysis will be very helpful.

Um could you also speak to um the uh now obviously understand it's driven by the CBA, but can you just in general level set for us in terms of how the uh the the pay and incentives um are helping us ensure that we've got the the best trained and the the most motivated folks, if you will, and help us understand how that helps us uh compare with other large cities in Texas.

Yes, specifically on retention and recruiting, um, as we know it's a lot more expensive to uh to lose folks and have to retrain uh recruit and and retain uh retrain folks.

So if you could speak to how the pay and compensation um contributes to our competitiveness as an employer.

Yes, ma'am.

I think we're also as we're looking at you know major developments downtown.

I saw the uh you know the staffing and the resource levels and and how it's different for a high rise versus not a high rise.

It'd be really helpful, and maybe this is part of your needs assessment.

But if you could help us understand how um housing uh developments in certain areas are also driving what you anticipate will be uh your needs, the type and and if it speaks to hey, somebody that is able to respond to a high rise or participate in that is is actually more expensive to train, takes longer to train, etc.

It'd be helpful for us to understand how some of the major developments that we're tracking and how those uh what those cursory then impacts are are on your um resource needs and and staffing needs.

Yes, ma'am.

Um Chief McManus.

Um Chief, the staffing analysis that was provided um by Dr.

Weiss, it speaks to um it speaks to an uh analysis adjustments.

Um has that taken place?

And what I'm getting at is understood the plan, understand the plan was presented into 2023, it has recommendations.

As we've seen some improvements or changes in um in the environment, how do we understand that that recommendations are still appropriate?

And I I think that maybe is is what that that term analysis adjustments is is trying to reflect.

So I want to understand have those analysis adjustments occurred or they anticipated at a different point in time that would help understand your budget in light of that.

I think that the uh I think the adjustment you're talking about, Mayor.

If I understand it, is the uh adding the adding the 360 officers and what that what that what the impact of that would be.

Yeah, it is on, it's on the last slide.

It says next steps, analysis adjustments.

That's all it says.

So I am assuming it means hey, we're gonna we're going to, you know, we're gonna make recommendations, we're gonna put it in place, and we're going to adjust our analysis based on how we see what is working and what isn't working.

I'm assuming that's what it means, but that's all it says on this slide.

So that's what I'd like to understand since that recommendation was made in 2023, and we're now in 2025.

talk about mayor if I understand it is the uh adding the adding the 360 officers and what that what that what the impact of that would be yeah it is on it's on the last slide it says next steps analysis adjustments that's all it says so I am assuming it means hey we're gonna we're going to you know we're gonna make recommendations we're gonna put it in place and we're going to adjust our analysis based on how we see what is working and what isn't working I'm assuming that's what it means but that's all it says on this slide so that's what I'd like to understand since that recommendation was made in 2023 and we're now in 2025 good afternoon mayor and council so um we evaluate the impact of that analysis on an annual basis uh chief blanton actually and his team they look at the staffing of each of our substations by shift and where we are specifically on that goal of 4060 uh 60 percent percent proactive so we evaluate that constantly um so we are making those adjustments as needed with the goal of achieving the 4060 for all of our shifts and all of the substations okay good great thank you uh chief thanks you you preempted one of my questions I appreciate the 25 additional detectives on domestic violence uh as you saw in the the memo regarding the council committees I've got a priority on interpersonal violence as well as a priority on um public safety needs specific to our seniors um so can you speak you've already spoken to the interpersonal violence piece can you speak a little bit to um any unique public safety um uh investments or changes in the budget that may impact uniquely our senior community I think all the the uh adjustments that I mentioned uh in that list uh have a had a very significant impact uh on the community if we can go back to that slide um I think it was in the budget slide so adding adding the uh the 445 officers over the years uh the implementation of records management system opening St.

Mary's substation I don't mean to uh be redundant and run through them again but they I think they're all very important uh essay core implementation we worked on that for uh quite a long time before we finally got to where we needed to be uh the 25 domestic violence detectives that you mentioned the 24 additional safe officers you can't go to a community meeting where uh the folks aren't asking for more safe officers um the uh and again the bottom line here is it reflects you know investment in in uh in public safety and what the community actually is asking for and what will benefit them sure yeah I appreciate that um and I'll be clear are there um any additional enhancements in in public safety resources that maybe are specific to the unique needs of our seniors and if uh if not well we I mean that specifically to the seniors we have our we have our uh elder crimes unit yes yeah so no okay yeah okay thank you um and again as we as the council members try to understand um your budget in the context of their district the uh the reduction in crime um would you say that has been equal across uh equally distributed across the city or is there a way in which we could understand what that decrease has looked like by district I would say mayor that that the um equity comes in where you have our hot spots located thro throughout the city and in in the majority of those well almost all of those hot spots except for the one up in Prue if I remember one of the one of the uh one of the uh presentations made some time ago uh all of those had equitable uh reductions in violent crime and mayor will as part of the follow-up to questions that aren't answered here we can include that breakout by council district for you guys yeah appreciate that thank you um and chief can you speak to um how impacts from um immigration related requests for support um are reflected in in funding needs in this year's budget request how again mayor I'm sorry yeah so um requests for support to sub for immigration related activities um how is that how is the need or how is the ability to support that reflected in your budget request mayor that doesn't uh just for an update on what we've been requested I think we've been requested maybe once up at uh a business that was uh hiring folks who were providing uh false social security numbers but we haven't been called that often and uh when we're called we're simply called for uh perimeter support which is what we were called for up at that uh location I just mentioned but it's really uh negligible the number of times that we've been asked to help thank you chief uh chief obleto yes ma'am um the uh the service area for the um the students it was on slide 10 may I ask why you display the data this way versus by council district I'm gonna let the subject matter and expert answer that this is Katie Kappler she is our court manager over juvenile services okay and I asked because while somebody might live in Northside ISD they actually now go to a charter school right or

May I ask why you display the data this way versus by council district.

I'm gonna let the subject matter expert answer that.

This is Katie Kappler, she is our court manager over juvenile services.

Okay, and I ask because while somebody might live in Northside ISD, they actually now go to a charter school, right?

Or they go to Central Catholic or so I'm I'm interested in why the data is presented this way.

Um hi, good afternoon.

Um up until the next coming weeks, we haven't had a database that tracks that we get lists, large lists of students.

Um, so to try to track it by council district has been difficult because even within those school districts, they fall into different council districts.

Um the next coming weeks, month, we should be getting a new database system that ITSD has been working on it for us.

Um and it'll actually use the students' address in connection to find my council district to identify those districts, and then for the ones that are outside council district limits, we're going to cross-reference those with uh zip codes so we can get a better understanding there.

Yeah, great.

Thank you.

That'll be helpful not only for the public safety committee, but also for the educational opportunities uh committee, so we're adequately understanding uh the challenge and the opportunity.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome.

Um, at this point, I'm gonna um personal point of personal privilege.

I'm gonna recognize uh the chair of the public safety committee and then the chair of the municipal court committee, um, and then turn it over to uh the rest of the council.

But chairwoman, please.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, thank you all so much for the presentation.

Thank everyone for being here.

Standing room only, we love seeing that.

Um, you know, Chief Chief McManus made this comment that our budget focuses on frontline control and administrative functions, and they're essential in keeping our city safe.

While we agree, I think there's a lot more to public safety than just that, and we have the opportunity to talk about some of that today.

Public safety truly represents our community's well-being.

So, what is included in that?

It means street lights, it means safe passageway to schools for kids.

It means our stray and loose dogs, and I know that we have our ACS folks back here and are gonna have a separate conversation about that.

It means a safe affordable housing, security for affordable housing, and most importantly, mental health supports, which we've been making a lot of progress on.

And so I'm excited to dive into some of that today.

So I'll start off with highlighting um the fire department.

Chief Rosso, I think you've done a great job.

Are we full year in now already?

November almost, yeah.

So we love seeing almost so you've done a great job.

You've come in and taken charge.

We've gotten so much great feedback on it.

I wanted to thank you for the leadership of the work that you're doing.

I actually learned a lot about the squad program through this budget cycle, and I think the squad program is amazing.

Like I didn't even know that it was running, quite frankly, and through advocacy, I was able to learn in detail what it looks like.

So we have three of the busiest stations in district one.

So four and tens are coming up, and then also nineteens.

So I think four and nineteens are coming up this year, and then tens is gonna be next year, and I'm glad to see that that station has located additional land for that growth.

But uh, I think it's great how we're being efficient with our resources, how we're making sure we're thinking about longevity with our uh our trucks and our vehicles.

So I wanted to commend you on continuing to lead that program and advocating for the needs of the fire department.

We always kind of say this where uh our fire department is doing so good that the bar continues to say hi, but I think the needs assessment that I'm glad that Eric is funding this year is gonna really show what do we need to continue to invest in in the future.

So just wanted to thank you for your leadership.

I don't have any specific questions.

Thank you, Council Warner.

Absolutely.

Um from the SAPD department, I want to thank Chief for I don't have specific questions for you, Chief, but just thank you for your leadership and everything that you've done over the years.

How many years are you in now for a city service?

Uh yeah.

I've been here for I've been here for nearly 20 and uh quite a long time before that.

Well, we appreciate your longevity with the department.

Thank you, Councilman.

Um, and uh Jesse, I want to commend you on the presentation for SA Core.

Um that was uh this program.

We I was like, where did she go?

We um we advocated for this last year to make this 24-7 because we only had two shifts.

And look at the data.

We've had over 4,400 responses, 500 of the 2500 people.

That's 25% of the people are getting follow-up for mental health services.

I'm just repeating the data that was on that slide.

But I just think that's super commendable and would love to see us grow this program.

The next presentation, maybe back to public safety can be how do we grow that to our in-house population?

What does it look like to provide those mental health services there?

Because that's a big gap that maybe our street outreach team can learn from what's happening at SA Core to help bridge that.

So I wanted to thank you for that.

Um, as far as uh I'm gonna make this request because we've been talking about it for a while, but our bike patrol, we love our downtown bike patrol, so figuring out how we can continue to advocate for additional support there.

The our downtown neighbors love bike patrol, and they just the presence for them is great.

So I wanted to make sure we can figure out how to continue to support that.

Um, and then lastly, the good neighbor and DART program.

We talked about this.

The good neighbor program is so challenging because we've do done a great job of taking this.

Is a program where we've actually taken data to help us create change in our community, but it's that going to the next step that we've seen some um struggle and challenge with.

And I know you're working on it.

We got additional staff for that this year, but we have to keep pushing on this program and figuring out innovative ways to help these folks that are going through, and this is a perfect example of not just SAPD, right?

Because those cases have code case, those houses have code cases on them.

They have additional um, you know, ACS issues.

There are a lot of different departments that interplay, and that's a part of the challenge and actually enforcing, but I just wanted to say, like, let's keep figuring out how do we move the needle on now that we've identified these, actually seeing um more uh f progress and forward movement with them.

Um, from the municipal court, this is where I have a couple of questions.

First of all, you guys do so much great work and know um thank you for bringing up that point, uh, Mayor about the the way we track data for our youth and figuring out additional layers to actually break it down in.

Like how many of those uh families are coming from underserved backgrounds, how many of them are dealing with attendance, you know, different issues that we could track that show not just the school district but really the community impact factors that may be affecting them in the services that they're receiving from the juvenile court.

Um but specifically, I wanted to talk about the double magistration process.

This has come up a lot, and I wanted for you to tell me a little bit about.

I don't know transparently a lot about that, but I'd love to hear more of what does that look like and what is the impact to our officers for having a double magistration process.

And we've been talking a lot about City County collaboration lately, and so is there an opportunity for collaboration here?

Um I I think that there is.

Uh, with regards to uh SABD SAPD time, I I'll let the chief speak to that, but I can talk to you again, walk you through the court process.

So, what happens is when a person is arrested, an SAPD officer writes a police report.

He or she talks to the assistant district attorney who goes over that report and makes sure that everything that needs to be in that report is in the report.

The officer then takes the report to MAGCORT staff.

MAG court staff creates a case, a case file.

That case file is then turned over to the magistrate that is on duty who makes an independent probable cause finding.

So even though the assistant district attorney may think that there is probable cause to accept the case, a magistrate who does his or her own her own independent review may decide.

I don't think there's enough probable cause to accept this case and may decide to reject that case.

If the case is accepted, the person is told what they are charged with, the arrested person is told what they are charged with, they are explained what their rights are, and the magistrate signs a commitment to jail.

So that means that the magistrate, the the arrested person is sent to the Bear County jail where he is supposed to post bond, or she is supposed to post bond.

I want to mention though that municipal court has been doing, has been providing citywide magistrate services for the entire county since 1974.

We've been doing it till since 1974, and up until 2007 when the county jumped in.

All those years, it involved committing a person to jail to post bond.

What is happening once that person is committed to jail is the district clerks are recreating the case file.

They're resubmitting it to the assistant district attorney who's at the county facility office as the assistant district attorney at the city facility.

They're doing another review of it.

The judge, the magistrate, the county magistrate, is then doing a re-evaluation of probable cause, and then a reissuing of Article 1517 statutory warnings, and then setting bond.

So it does feel like there's a little bit of overlap there that we might be able to work on efficiencies for.

What we have suggested in the past is sharing a system.

We've also recommended that we can send um people's names up ahead so that they're prepared for them, and all they have to do is all they are legally responsible for doing at that point once they're set sent over to county is set bond.

There is no legal reason for them to redo what they do.

So I don't understand why they do it.

Okay, let's follow up on that.

Maybe we can bring it back to public safety and think about solutions that we can work on, Maria.

If we can chairwoman, that's one of the things I tasked the uh municipal court advisory, the court committee to also look at.

But look at that same page.

Yeah.

Okay, great.

Um, that would be awesome.

Thank you.

The last thing I just wanted to say is if we could also take a look at our illegal dumping fines to see what those are, if they've been increased.

I know that was it wasn't on the list, but it's a really big challenge for our community, and then code enforcement fines when they're multiple.

So I've you said perfectly our goal is compliance in that, but in the event that the same individual or the same um uh apartment owner is having multiple fines, we'd like to see an escalation in those fines so that it's more of a deterrent.

It's one of the challenges we have with our um our program that monitors the uh apartment complexes that have code violations that that we don't see them increasing enough to cause them to change behavior in that in the enforcement side of things.

So those two things we'd love to see if there's an opportunity for in this budget, and then with those extra funds, we could fund our our street light program because that needs additional funding, and I know some of my colleagues are gonna highlight that as well.

Uh thank you, Mayor, for the opportunity.

Thank you, Judge.

Thank you, Chairwoman.

Go ahead.

One other thing to just add on, and certainly as the committees talk about this, the chief didn't add, but I think as it relates to the the question about double magistration, there's an operational impact that that frankly I think is is more the driving factor for how it's set up.

It's not really the as Judge Obleda laid out the the duplication of what the magistrates are doing.

But it it's it's for us for the city, the operational impact of the process is probably more important from an impact on neighborhood services.

So I know the committees will likely get into that, and we'll certainly prepare for that conversation.

Chown Viegran.

Thank you.

Yes, I look forward to working with you, Judge O'Bleto, on how we approach the county on this issue.

I've been following this for quite a while, so it should be interesting.

I'm looking forward to that.

But I want to start with the uh fire um and go in order.

I want to thank um you all for the presentation.

I thought this was well, come on up because I do I do have a question for you, Chief Rosto.

One, I want to I I think the pay increase and what we have for both police and fire is well deserved.

You work very hard to make sure that you are serving the community.

Fire is key in helping me with my seniors and getting the message out on safety.

So I I'm super excited about that.

But I do want to talk about the cause for concern and if it could be um the the response time and how we're going to address that and get it back to our eight minutes.

Uh, do you have any ideas on how we're gonna move forward?

Is the length of trip being we don't have the uh equipment or um what can we do?

Is it the streets?

Tell me I need more money in district three to make better streets and and faster streets for the the trucks to get there.

So can you just elaborate on that a little?

Yes.

Uh actually the response time, there's many factors that go into that.

There when you uh portion it out, there's the call processing time, the turnout time, you know, the the response from station to the scene.

So there are a lot of components to that.

Um honestly, I I feel as though the eight minute 45 around there that we're at is not really drawing concern just yet, only because I know that we have the clinical dispatch program.

So there's a lot more time being spent on the front end so that we can be more efficient with the units that we dispatch.

Um because we don't want to dispatch a whole lot of people and and resources if it's just a uh a small problem.

So on the front end, having paramedics is it works to our advantage because we have technology that we can assess the patient over the phone, we can gather information now for critical calls.

Obviously, the the minute they know that it's something life-threatening, they are dispatching and gathering information as those units are in route.

Um so I think it's important to take that into consideration.

So that's the only reason I say it's not of concern, and I think we're working towards improving that um by the additional squads and trying to be smarter about our dispatch.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

Because I just wanted that explained a little because people are gonna see that and they're like, What do we need?

Um I like the idea of the proposed drones, but I would like to see uh some very specific uh goal setting where we're on how we're going to use the drones and and how well that they are um utilized within the areas, and I of course I'm gonna go back to district three geographically um the largest district in San Antonio and and as you know, lots of um space where grass fires start, uh lots of space where we have um you know abandoned homes or uh just difficulty to get to, so I want to make sure that we use that for that, and then as we move forward looking at the multi-dwelling units and the multi-story units, making sure we have the equipment needed as the as district three and and the southern sector continues to grow, that we have the ladder trucks and and what is needed, or as you mentioned, the technology that we need that if we if we see a problem we can get there uh within enough time.

So thank thank you for um the presentation.

Uh I look forward to working with your uh your firefighters as we roll out in the fall our different events with the seniors and that fall prevention.

I'm always I'm always talking fall prevention for for our seniors as as they go through.

So thank you.

Uh I do want to bring up um Chief McMahonis.

Uh you mentioned, and I I just want to make sure as as we go forward with um with what we're doing in terms of domestic violence, that we continue to look at and and we use the new technology for AI, and I can't remember what slide it was in terms of police writing, that we do kind of recognize any implicit bias that might be there among some of the detectives or uh some of the patrol officers.

Uh I've I've gotten at least two incidences uh from advocates that um again uh the victim was a lot of responsibility was put in on the victim for the incident, and I really think we need to we need to take a look at our our implicit bias as we do that.

Um whatever the situation is regarding that uh there is no need for physical violence in in a in a dispute or a relationship, and I think we need to get back to that to that respect to that decorum, um, to just the the understanding of what what personal spaces and and rights are, and so I really just want to make sure that as we use technology, because I'm all for using technology, that the um that the implicit bias that can come from using some technology is addressed as we move forward.

So uh that that's my one thing.

And the other is talk to me about um because we had our town hall yesterday.

Point in topic was um those that are houseless, those are that are living in encampments, and the criminal element to that.

So, do we have data on what we're seeing is drug related?

Because my residents are confident that every encampment has some sort of drug paraphernalia or um some sort of some sort of uh personal property crime that has been stolen from the community.

I know that's not always the case, but this is this is what we're facing in our community.

So how are we dealing with that?

And do we need to talk more about um the drug the the drug problem that San Antonio is facing currently?

Yeah, thanks for that, Councilmember.

So your constituent was uh was correct.

There is often uh more often than not drug issues in these encampments, uh drug issues lead to um assault of offenses, they lead to robberies, people robbing other people of their drugs.

Um you know, when we years ago when um we would approach a homeless encampment, there's folks would run.

They don't do so anymore.

We approach them um as a as a uh uh collaborative effort among city departments.

Um we offer them services, uh we offer to transport them to these services, including their pets.

Um most of them don't take the services, and they you know, so they wind up being moved.

And uh, you know, it's just uh as you know, as everybody in here knows, it's just a you know constant turnover of um encampments and abatements.

So um I wish I had the solution to that.

And as we move forward, if we could just get the amount of time, and I don't know if it's by substation about how we're spending on that.

And then the last well, I have I have two minutes, but the other thing is we know the South Substation is coming.

I'm very excited about that.

You know how much growth we are having out there with new housing and development.

I know that we put forward what new officers look like.

Uh and Maria, maybe you can speak to this in terms of the 25.

What is out there federally?

Because you know, I'm ready to talk to my congressmen in my district about getting federal dollars for additional officers.

Is it out there?

Are we applying for it?

Where are we on that?

Uh yes, ma'am.

Uh we submitted an application for 25 police officers through the cops grant.

Uh, we typically are aware of the result of that application probably in late September, maybe up to November.

So that application is out there that we submitted it.

So is that in addition to the 25 we have currently in the budget, or would that be is that in addition to because what we have in the budget is funding 25 officers.

If we do get the grant, we still have to provide a cash match.

So we would um it'll be savings if you will, to to the amount that we have in the budget today.

Now the grant only covers three years, and then after that, the city is responsible for a hundred percent of the cost.

Um, but is that in addition to the 25?

So at the state level, is there anything we can do statewide that they're providing for um public safety?

Not for new positions, councilwoman, no.

Uh okay.

So you said not new positions.

Is there a possibility where we if the where the state would allow us to incentivize so maybe people don't maybe some of our patrol officers do not take early retirement uh and maybe it's not early, but that we can incentivize some of our patrol officers to stay a little longer.

Is there something in the state at that level what we could do?

I don't believe so, councilwoman.

There was a bill that was passed, and I don't remember the specifics.

I I will put that on the follow-up.

Okay, so I don't know which union members are out there, but I think we need to lobby the state about incentivizing our current officers to stay.

Uh and I will loop back in about municipal court because we've got a lot to share about that.

Thank you.

Councilmember White.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, Judge Blato, Fred, thank you all so much for uh for your presentations and and your leadership.

Uh I'm just gonna focus my comments today with uh Chief Frausto and then Chief McManus.

Um Chief Frausto first.

Um and I want to say this here here publicly when when you when you took the position, uh you asked me sort of what's what's the most important thing that you need uh from us, and and we talked about communication.

And since you have been there, um you have more than lived up to your commitment to communicate with us uh right up through yesterday, in fact, where we had that chemical leak uh in District 10, and I was getting uh texts from the chief um literally every every you know half an hour or so with an update on what's going on.

So um thank you so much for your leadership and thank you for for the great communication um with all of us.

I know we all feel that way.

Um very happy to see the fire needs assessment uh that that we're gonna do.

I think that's a extremely uh important.

I think that uh councilman it was Maki Rodriguez, I believe, that uh was one of the ones that that initiated uh that so I was happy to um work with him on that as I know others were because I think that's gonna be very important and seeing exactly what resources you all need moving forward.

Uh pleased to see in the budget that we're adding 12 um more positions as well as um some new squads, and uh I also want to say I'm appreciative of you guys going through your budget to try to find some uh efficiencies and and financial savings, and I know that as we um I know the city did that really across all departments, and as we move forward uh this year and into next year and and try to implement a new uh budgeting model here, uh we're gonna continue to to try to find efficiencies and eliminate redundancies so that we can put more money towards the priorities uh of the citizens of San Antonio.

Uh my one question for you, Chief, on slide 15.

Uh, when we're looking at the 10 busiest uh single company engines, uh some are doing more than 4500 calls a year.

Uh any strategies there to help with with burnout and and and making sure those folks get the support that they need.

Actually, yes.

Um as far as the the squads that have been in service thus far at single company stations, the work distribution is making it a lot more um I mean they can they can tolerate the run volume now.

Whereas before uh they were making you know calls all day overnight, so this certainly is going to help with their sleep patterns with just them being ready for you know responding to perhaps a a fire in the middle of the night um with the units being available and in-house ready to respond to those calls.

So I I definitely think that that's gonna make an impact and you know, towards firefighter wellness in general.

And Councilman, I mean if you look at the chart, um uh the second and third bar charts, uh, engine 19 and engine four.

Um that this data is from fiscal year 24.

We had enhanced squads start at both those stations at the beginning of July, so a little over a month ago.

So the fire department, there's the kid as the chief mentioned, will be monitoring that because they do anticipate when you look at uh engine 44 and 24, those several years ago were the busiest stations.

And so you've seen them kind of work down the the concept is is that as we add that additional staffing with that enhanced squad at the busiest stations, then it starts to to even out that that workload to to deal with both the issues you're describing and that the chief is replying on.

Okay.

Thank you, Chief.

Yes, thank you, Councilman.

Uh Chief McManus, um first of all, I want to uh commend you and and and your entire department.

Uh the the work you do is absolutely fantastic, and um you know we're we're lucky to have you and and your team in place and and all of our uh San Antonio police officers.

Um with that said, uh me and I'm sure all of my colleagues and everybody in this room would love to see less crime uh in this city.

Uh in April of this year, uh you got us the numbers of uh crimes against persons and crimes against uh property uh in each district.

In District one, and and I've combined the numbers, people and property, uh there were uh over 23,000 crimes last year against people and property in district one, in district two, fifteen thousand, in district three, thirteen thousand, in district four, twelve thousand, in district five, there were over thirteen thousand crimes against people and property, in district six, over thirteen thousand.

In District 7, over 10,000, in District 8, over 15,000.

In District 9, over 10,000.

Uh and in my district, district 10, um, there were over 9,000 um crimes against people or property in that year.

That's a lot of crime.

And I know that uh you uh and all of us want to do what we can to lower those figures in the coming years.

This plan that you uh that that we've talked about today uh related to uh switching how how our or what our officers are doing, I guess on a daily basis, moving to the 60 percent on patrol versus 40 percent on call.

It's your opinion, is it not, that by doing that, San Antonians will be safer?

Yeah, let me answer it this way if I can, Councilmember.

So the impact of getting to 6040 will have a positive collateral impact on different things uh as we serve the public.

So for example, we'll have more officers that are doing safe type work, safe officer type work, uh more officers on directed patrol, um, more officers addressing community problems in neighborhoods, which will um hopefully make, or in theory anyway, make the number of calls to communications less because they're handling problems before they get to a point where people are calling on them.

And then um the um positive impact of uh quicker response times with more officers out there, uh there's two ways to reduce response response times.

Number one, you add you add more officers, or you reduce the types of call that we respond to.

And that's how you make them the response time quicker, not by driving faster.

I appreciate the answer is yes.

Okay.

So but but let me let me ask it again and and see if I can I'd simplify it and just get the answer.

Getting to this 60-40 ratio with with adding the officers like we've talked about doing, in your opinion, will that make San Antonians safer?

Yes, it's important.

And and and the reason you say that is because by doing so, we will hopefully deter more crime.

Yes.

Okay.

And Chief, uh, I I would I would say then that you would agree, since since getting to 6040 will make San Antonian safer, the quicker we can do that, the better.

Yes.

Okay.

Um those are my questions for you, Chief.

And and uh and I appreciate that.

I I want to say that I um I agree with with Councilwoman Via Gran uh her overall approach to let's let's do what we can to find a way to fund more officers.

Uh and I'm all for that, Eric.

Um but I would say that we can make sure that we get to the 65 officers, that was the plan.

We can make sure that we do that ourselves through the general fund right now.

And I think you put in the presentation today, it's an additional 2.1 million dollars.

You've budgeted for 25.

If we stick with the plan, we need we were gonna get 65.

So we need 40 more officers, and you stated it's gonna cost an additional 2.1 million dollars.

We just heard from our head law enforcement official in San Antonio that getting these additional officers and getting us closer to that 6040 split in a in a more expeditious manner will make San Antonians safer.

So if public safety is our number one priority, I do not understand why we did not start in this budget with the funding for the 65 officers and then build everything else around it.

And so I I I know your job's hard, and I know you've got a million things that that you need to fund.

Um, but I would request that uh my council colleagues consider when we look at this budget how we can get to the 65 officers because this is too much crime, and we need to keep our citizens safe uh before we do anything else.

Thanks, Mayor.

Uh Chair Alterta Gavito.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh thank you so much to Chief Frasto and Chief McManus and uh Judge Ogledo for you and your teams for the presentations today.

Uh you know, we do we do talk about how public safety is a top priority for I believe a majority of our districts, and so it is a it is a core function of the city, and so we need to make sure that our police officers and our firefighters have the resources that they need to protect our communities.

Um and that when when cases are do reach the court system that they're set up to deliver justice.

I'm gonna start with the firefighters, chief Chief Rosto.

I also just want to sing your praises.

Thank you so much for the proactive communication.

Um I know Councilwoman Dr.

Core was saying, so it's been a year that you've almost November 1st will be a year.

Yeah, but I think it just makes such a difference to have you here and leading our fire department.

So thank you so much for all that you do.

Um really quick, I I don't know what slide number it was, but the unit response trending downward.

Is I remember in last year's budget presentation, you all talked about doing I forget what y'all call it, but like virtual calls.

You know, there was that video of like saving the baby just through that.

Is part of the reason that we're seeing that downward trajectory in unit response is because of that.

Yes, okay.

And um, but keep in mind that good Sam in the clinical dispatcher program, it allows or enables the paramedic dispatchers to provide care or to coach you know the individuals that are calling to um do CPR effectively.

So I think um that definitely has you know had positive results and positive outcomes.

Um and also it's important to mention that our critical calls, which consist of active shooter, the structure fire, cardiac arrest, uh major burns, drowning, electrocution, those types of calls are um for critical incident, the response times are much lower.

They are seven minutes uh twelve seconds.

Okay.

So um I think you know, again, I I have to give thanks to the dispatchers because they've been doing a great job dispatching and making sure that they're sending the appropriate units to handle that emergency.

And and and thank you for that.

And the reason I'm asking that is because in the the needs assessment, I wonder if it's worth us looking to expand on that program, you know, because if it can lessen the number of uh units responding to calls and we're seeing it be effective in that, um, you know, maybe it's worth looking into that.

Thank you.

Um also on slide 14, fire station 10, uh, that answers a lot of district seven residents' home.

So, what are the plans um if if we can share them?

And maybe this is a question from Maria Um to get that going.

Do we I don't know if we can share a location publicly or not, but I do anxious.

No, not yet.

Okay, got it.

Um we are definitely anxious uh and awaiting the upgrades to fire station 10 because again it solves for a lot of district district seven residents.

Um glad you are y'all are seeing the glad you all are doing the needs assessment.

I do think that's gonna be critical, and um I'm fully supportive of y'all's proposed budget.

Uh thank you, Chief Ross.

Yo, thank you.

I'm gonna move on to police uh Chief McManus.

Uh again, you know, kudos to you and and all of our police officers for the reduction in violent crime.

We also saw property uh crime is down too.

So this is good news for for residents.

Um you know, I'm I'm gonna echo Councilman White's um sentiment.

You know, we I think it's district seven, eight, nine, and ten, you know, we signed that memo.

That was a commitment that we made to residents to have those 65 police officers.

Residents don't care about our elections and who was who said it when they care about the commitment that was made to them.

And so um, Eric, I think that we need to do and structure our budget around that commitment made to them uh because uh that's what they were counting on.

And and Mark, I appreciate your questions to Chief McMahon is because you know, we know that in order to address public safety, which is a top concern of all of our residents, we know what we need to do.

So um, so just would echo us structuring our budget around having those 65 police officers that again were a commitment made to residents.

Um I had a question on slide 22.

Uh I know councilwoman uh Terry Castillo and I were talking about when we were looking at the um the uh cameras where is it is this on am I on the right slide?

Sorry, on the camera the downtown cameras, and I I know we shared the sentiment on expanding those cameras elsewhere in places of frequent illegal dumping or or places of animal abandonment.

I mean you could put those cameras at Woodon Lake, I'm sure y'all catch somebody um dropping off a dog there at least once a week.

Uh what is our plan for expanding that?

The ultimate goal would be to to do that.

Uh right now we have but if I could have meeting on what's today, uh Friday or Monday?

Um about those downtown cameras and the uh the uh the AI capability that they're supposed to have and um they did not function as they were supposed to function.

Okay.

So we're going back to the drawing board, but the the plan is to expand um the camera system to a much broader area uh even if we're not powering it by AI.

And and we had that discussion with uh with Craig as well from the technological um aspects of it.

So that's that's the goal.

And I will say, you know, when when we did implement the downtown cameras, um I started getting an uptick in residents asking us about it, you know, and and again to Councilwoman Castillo and my point of we're doing a downtown, we should do this elsewhere in other spots um in all of our districts that we know would benefit for them.

So if you can keep us updated on the plan and uh we can figure out how to move that faster, that would be helpful.

Yes, ma'am.

Um I know councilwoman Via Grand touched on drones, and Chief Rosser, y'all said y'all are using drones.

Is the police department using drones?

And if so we've had the drone program for quite a while, and we use it at major events.

We use it for traffic investigation, we use it at barricades.

Um we use it very, very frequently.

Awesome.

Any plans on um doing more of it?

I believe we'll uh we it we'll expand it to the point where we're satisfied that we have what we need.

Yes.

But they're they are absolutely fantastic in the capabilities that they provide us.

Okay, yeah, and I mean I can attest to that.

We see them um when uh the city's July 4th firework show at Woodlong Lake.

I mean, drones are flying all around, scaring the ducks everywhere, but that's okay.

Um because we know that at least uh the crowd is is kept an eye upon.

So um thank you for that.

I share councilwoman Dr.

Sukcore's excitement about the SA core program.

I know that we did partner in that for 24-7 um coverage, and obviously we are seeing amazing results.

So kudos to you on that.

I think one of the things um because I I do have to ask, um, that I'm going to continue pushing for is a mental health crisis menu option when people do call 911.

Um I know Austin does it, and I think that if it can get to the SA core team faster, you know, and and again, uh well, let me take a step back and clarify.

So if if somebody has an emergency, you know, they can either go to a police officer or if there's a mental health crisis um menu option, if it can get help just a second best or you know, that's something that we definitely um are still aspiring to.

Uh I think that's it for police, and then uh thank you, Chief McManus.

Um Judge Oblado, thank you so much for your presentation.

You and Fred, obviously I know y'all do such an amazing job.

Um, and thank you for your continued work.

I know that one of the um slides that you showed was the animal docket, and so those are great results.

One of the things that uh and I I just want to share with everybody when we had you all um and the judge over the animal cases at uh our district seven public safety town hall focused on animal issues, we heard loud and clear that neighbors want to see their neighbors be held accountable, you know, and we we hear that repeated at so many of our events, whether it's with an animal issue or uh a code compliance issue or whatever the case is.

So I'm glad to see um the uptick in in holding people accountable, um especially regarding animal issues.

So thank you so much for that.

That those are all my comments.

Um that's all my comments.

Thank you.

Councilmember Spears.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um well, I too wanna say thank you to Chief Rostow, Chief McManus, and Judge Obledo for all of your hard work and your presentation and the time you put into it and the commitment that you have clearly to your to your departments and everything that you're doing.

Um I wanna just go pretty quickly, but I just I just wanted to ask with Chief Rostow.

I'm excited about the needs assessment.

I think it's gonna be great.

I'm excited to hear about the fourth shift and things that could come up there.

I see that's working well in some other cities.

And um I wanted to say y'all are doing some great work on obtaining grant dollars there.

I saw that y'all obtained some new mental health grants that and federal grants that were out there that are gonna be really impactful to our comprehensive units and then um the addiction recovery units too.

So um I wanted to, I too was echoing Mayor what you you brought up about the seniors and low-income residents and how the impact of the EMS fee will will the adjustment of the EMS fee will impact that that group of people because they do use it a lot.

And um, if there's any programs we can do to assist with assisting the seniors in their isolation that drives that demand for the EMS, um I'm definitely interested in being helpful there.

And I was wondering how quickly we would be able to scale the squads to um meet the growth for the enhanced squads.

I mean, how long would that take for us to get well we did uh an internal review and we found that if we um add to this year and then we'll request to the following year budget year, in fact, for two more years.

So that'll give us six.

I think we'll level out because it's only gonna impact the the areas that have high call volume.

Um but if we you know move forward with that plan, I think we'll be good.

Okay, yes.

Thank you.

Yes, Chief McGnis, thank you so much for all your hard work.

Um I'm gonna say it real quick out loud that I want our new substation in in Stone Oak area on the record.

Um but I can't agree more.

Seeing that number of the 40 new officers that we can do it at 2.1 and the 5.9 feels completely attainable with the budget that we have.

Reasonable, attainable, impactful.

My district is screaming at me for this.

They need it.

We are not a walkable district.

It is driving, y'all being around, impact speeding, street racing, um, thefts, everything.

Just just knowing you're there brings a sense of comfort and and confidence in and definitely in my district.

So I'm fully supportive of that.

We're a fun city, and we stretch our force so much when we do our fun activities like Fiesta.

So I think we can definitely use this and it'd be helpful.

So anything you need on that front, I'm completely supportive and will help in any way I can.

I wanted to echo what you also asked for Mayor, the um heat map showing the response times.

Um especially when it comes to the high growth areas of the city would be helpful to me.

And um again, thanks for applying for those grants.

That's really great.

That that's that's important for us.

And very helpful.

But I really want to do I want to do anything we can to get to that 60% proactive target.

So consider me your ally in that.

Thank you.

And Judge Ableto, thank you so much.

I really I think you're doing a great job.

I wanted to just touch on one thing with you is that the um family violence completions dropped just quite a bit to me.

And I noticed when I went to the state of homelessness presentation that they said that the first time homeless population, 50% of that are victims of domestic violence, and a lot of kids, and that so that really hits me in a in a deep deep way.

Because I just think we need to be mindful and working on that result and how we can be supportive in that and how it impacts our homeless population with that being the truth.

So um, but thank you.

I don't know if you have a response, but thank you for all your hard work.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilman.

So I have some time left, and I did invite Joe Jones, the pro the uh president of the San Antonio Firefighters Association to come, and I'm yielding my five minutes to him, if that's fine.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Council.

Thank you, Councilwoman Spears.

Um, was there something specific that you would like for me to address or speak to?

Well, I I know we've talked a lot about the the needs assessment and the things I'm excited to see that there.

We've talked about the fourth shift, and I was just thinking that you could be helpful in indifying everything Chief Frosto said today, and any other input you might have.

Well, first let me express my gratitude for allowing San Antonio Firefighters and Paramedics a voice in this process.

It's important.

City Manager Walsh, the deputy city manager, Maria Viegomas have always been very good about that.

And thank you to Fire Chief Frosto for all of her staff's work uh putting this budget together.

It's not an easy task.

Um regarding what we see up there, uh we see some troubling things.

Um we see run response times uh at 826, I think, in climbing consistently every year, and that's a problem.

We also see the need for enhanced squads or what we call heavy squads as some of these really busy single companies, right?

Um at 4500 runs for an engine company, that's a run that's that's right in 12 calls a shift in that neighborhood.

There's a plus-minus on it, right?

Even at 4,000, that's 11 calls a shift.

Now a call can take anywhere from 20, 30 minutes to hours, you know.

So there's a there's a variable there.

But getting back to that response time, I look at that, that's problematic for us because what it's doing is it's increasing the wear and tear on the most important, and that also the most important investment by the city on that entire fire apparatus, and that is the people, right?

Uh the enhanced squads.

There's nothing enhanced the bottom, it's a pickup truck with a medic box.

The only thing that enhances those things is the two firefighters that are trying to save lives, right?

And those offset some of the call volume on the engine company.

But those engines, so I look at specifically engine 44 on the slide, and engine 44 used to be number one until they staffed their squad and brought their squad on, and now that's dropped them to what was it, number five or six, and they're still clocking in right around 4,000.

So we're starting to see the science behind what those enhanced squads can do, right?

Which is they're reducing the call volume, but they're not reducing it at the quantity that we really need at these single companies.

Reality is is we have all the hardware we need already at double companies across the city.

Now there are 23 double companies, 22 equipped with ladder uh companies, and then one that is a double engine company.

Um they all are equipped with squads already, which is the hardware, the pickup truck, the medical kit.

Um, but what they do is they steal from the heavy apparatus that the engine in the ladder to staff it for medical calls.

So that squad is not always in service the way it is at the end, the single companies.

So one of the reasons we looked at that as a creative solution for the overheating system that we're dealing with is it's a turnkey solution.

The hardware is already there.

But it would have an immediate positive impact.

Independent of that, I look at that, I look at that eight minute response time.

And it's been above eight minutes for the last two, three, four years.

Um and it's steadily increasing, and it'll continue to increase.

San Antonio is getting busier.

You know, we look at um, you know, across the spectrum to our police officers, and they've responsibly continued to add officers.

Yeah, as Chief McMahon is indicated, there's only way two ways to solve that problem.

You either reduce service or you increase uniforms.

Couldn't agree more.

Well, the same problem exists on our side as well.

Unfortunately, we haven't kept up with that.

The last fire station that we added was fire station 54, and that was in January 2020, if I remember correctly.

Prior to that, it was 52s and 53s, and that goes back to, I don't know, Eric, can you help me out?

Is that 2015 maybe?

Somewhere in that ballpark.

So we're seeing a consistent increase in the stress on our firefighters and our paramedics, but we're not seeing anything to alleviate it, which leads us to have to pivot into that fourth shift, right?

So we look around for a staffing model, and we talk things like parity, you know, with our brethren across the aisle again, you know, and police, police staff 40 hours a week, right?

We work on average 56 hours a week, okay.

Um we're looking at the perspective that led us to working 56 hours a week, and it's an antiquated perspective because when you're clocking in at 12, 11, 10, even nine and eight runs a uh shift, you're not sleeping through the night.

And that disruption of circadian rhythm is really what's what kills us.

That's what it leads to.

Increase in heart disease, strokes, cancers, all the other that we have hard data on, right?

So those are some of the the challenges that we're seeing, which is why we have to address now, you know.

The experts would probably say this is more appropriate for negotiations.

And I say the staffing study and the equipment study and the facility study is movement towards the right direction.

But I can also tell you that I've seen a budget slide on stations 52, 53, 10s, 21s, and uh 33.

Thank you, Eric.

Um I saw that in fiscal year 23 as well.

So we're not adding new stations.

We're not addressing the root problem.

We're addressing some of the symptoms, and we're doing replacement stations, not new stations.

So it's not alleviating the pressure on the system, which is why I think we need to take a hard look and invest in honest discussions about adding a fourth shift, which we have the model already.

Thank you, Mr.

Jones.

EMS.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you.

Mayor, can I get a question?

So part of that also, and I think councilwoman, the issue you raised generally about the needs assessment.

There's there's a balance between, and if you've if anybody has noticed the newer fire stations that the city has built over the last 12 years, they're all overbuilt in terms of additional capacity.

And and they're they're they're built that way with the thought that as in field development occurs or expansions occurs, we've got the facility to be able to add an additional truck, an additional EMS unit, and what have you.

And there was a period of the mid-80s, late 80s where the fire stations were constructed like boxes, and probably about the size of this room right here, and there was no expansion capability.

So part of what I think the needs assessment is going to look at is you know, where do we whether we replace it or we whether we replace the fire station or we add a fire station, the the concept is being able to balance what that service requirement is.

So I think that'll be an interesting process for us to go through and and really kind of have somebody kick the tires and tell us these are the trends you should be aware of, right?

As the senior population increases or uh development continues to go out on the southeast side of town or what have you.

Um and then you know, finally, I'll I'll I'll I'll respond to the fourth shift.

It would be certainly my standpoint that that would be something that we would need to look at really closely.

Um there was there was a time in the last collective bargain agreement where uh that issue was raised by the fire association.

Um Joe and his team, and um it would come with a pretty heavy increase in personnel that I think absent the conversation about what do we want and what do we need would um would be something that we would really need to look at.

Um and you know, as Joe mentioned, it's debatable whether or not it is um I would never recommend to the council that we make staffing a requirement of a collective bargaining agreement because times change and um I'm well aware, and some of the other council members are well aware of things that get put into collective bargain agreements and they get stuck in there, and then it takes 40 years to get out.

Um so in in neither agreement right now do we have staffing requirements?

And so I'd be very cautious about that, but assuming we would talk through that as we do the needs assessment.

Thanks.

Councilwoman uh Mesa Gonzalez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, just wanted uh uh thank Chief McManus and Chief Frosto and Judge Oblato for the presentations.

Uh wanted to highlight my support uh on the needs assessment that we're doing with uh SAFD and squad program.

I think when uh the mayor's talked about services, specific services to our seniors and our youth.

Um SA core is I think at the heart of that and the mobile integrated health care.

So is there I don't I don't know if we're doing this now, but is there some sort of highlight we can give on what MIH is doing in this fiscal year or programs related to our seniors?

I do believe I have some information on that.

Um if not, if I can't find it, I will um get back to you with the complete list.

But let me see it's uh 22 of the backup slides.

I think so.

Okay, this is a complete listing of the MIH programs that we have currently in place, and it consists of 10 in total.

So all of these are targeting, you know, the the vulnerable populations or special populations.

I did think that I thought this slide had the number of contacts.

Do we have a slide on the contacts?

I could have sworn I saw that okay.

I'll have to get back to you on that.

I'm sorry.

Um, and then on for public safety, I just like Councilman Spears said, I hear that in District 8 all the time.

Uh District 8 is ripe for drag racing with Wurzbog Parkway and Houseman Road.

Um, and the more that we see officers out there, the the safer this community is.

So I'm in complete support of uh increasing the amount of officers to 65.

Do we have any is there any conversation or pilot programs we've talked about with regards to drag racing?

Uh councilmember we have an ad hoc task force that we use to address um the drag racers when they when we know they're coming into town, and we keep monitoring them on social media, and we really haven't had uh many incidents of that for quite some time now once they realize that we we cracked down on them and and the law changed in in Austin about what you can do with the vehicles and who you can arrest, and and it's gotten pretty uh pretty scary for them.

So we haven't seen very much of that lately.

I just got a I just got a text from a neighbor last night.

That's why.

Because Forza Walk Parkway, all the the houses that face it or their backyards face it, hear it all the time, you know, between that like one and three a.m.

time frame.

So I'm talking I'm talking primarily about the the uh car groups that the the I don't mean to call them car groups to get in trouble for that by the car groups.

Right.

But the uh the the takeover groups okay are is what I was referring to.

But as far as just single kind of I guess is there any sort of I mean it's kind of hard communication or uh education we can provide to residents, just someone calls in we'll have we'll have someone respond for sure.

And if it's a regular thing, uh we report it to traffic and traffic puts it on a list, and then as they rotate through their their various locations around the city, we'll eventually hit that place.

But but safe officers are good for that.

Okay, thank you.

Um for the integrated community safety office.

Um we know we're getting in that phase two.

Are we we started phase two with the root causes of crime?

So can you kind of can you shed light on the work that that department is doing with our school districts?

I'm gonna ask them to say that and let Maria come up and talk about that.

Hi, Maria Vargas with integrated community safety.

With the initial site, the property manager did cite truancy being an issue at that property.

And so the city attorney's office and SAPD were speaking with the ISDs in the area to try to identify many any issues.

It was summertime when we started there, so we couldn't catch them in the act.

And then when schools started, uh the truancy issue actually did not reappear.

And it did seem that the manager there at that property, who I give a lot of credit to going out there and talking with those um individuals, talking with the families, the safe officer at that location being there all the time.

The truancy issue just did not reappear for us to address in a formal way when school started in August.

With this location, the staff at the property have not been as cooperative with us to try to find those issues with that insight with the residents there.

Again, with it being summer, we have seen some youth out, but there's no truancy issue for us to address at this point in time.

But with schools starting, we can try to make it a point to see if that's something that we see at the property as we continue our work there.

Okay.

Ready, thank you.

Somebody have no.

Um, let's see.

I think that's it.

And just one, I know I mentioned this in the last um in the first budget work session we have, but just support for the new opportunities of wellness clinic.

I gave that information to our city manager.

Um, this is uh launched in 2023.

This was a response to a growing behavioral health needs in our community.

Um, the now clinic has become very vital for our San Antonio police officers, firefighters, EMS personnel, 911 operators, and city employees and their families.

Uh, we've seen over third actually 122,000 clinical encounters uh for 13,000 individuals.

Um over 1,300 encounters uh through the living room crisis diversion space.

So this is a space that folks can go to that are in that immediate uh mental health need uh without having to go to uh the ER.

So these are all valuable services that are housed in District 8.

So just want to make sure that uh we can support a clinic like this.

Uh that's all the questions I have for now.

Thank you.

Councilman Castillo Angiano.

Awesome, thank you.

Usually I'm the last one.

Um thank you all for putting the presentations together.

Um and Kawara made a really good point when we're talking about um public safety, right?

It's not just fire police or municipal, right?

We need to make sure that we're also taking care of traffic safety, um, violence prevention and street lighting.

Um so when residents talk of sorry, I uh I want to start with the police department first.

I don't think I have any questions, um kind of just feedback.

Um so when our residents talk about public safety, um, it's more than just police, right?

And we are all aware of the stewardship of public dollars.

We realize that our city has to focus on funding strategies that give us more return on our investment because we all want to make sure that we're getting the most impact with every penny.

Um, and so we must also remember that budgets are moral documents and reflect how we view and organize our priorities.

And so when our team looked at what researchers say what will and what will not make the most impact, kind of want to walk you through a little scenario.

So uh when we add another police officer, we have to remember that we're beholden to salary increases mandated by the CBA, right?

And also enough police cars uh and equipment for each officer.

And believe it or not, researchers have observed diminishing returns when we add more and more police officers to the force.

And I know that when we're talking about lowering crime, we can't just solve crime by adding police officers.

You know, there's many, many, many things that encompass this to make sure that we're prioritizing public safety when it comes to the city of San Antonio.

Um, and so what are better returns on investment?

It's integrated approaches, right?

That include addressing root causes of crime, um, and it's a much better investment.

So, for instance, lighting.

I know we were all kind of talking about lighting earlier.

Um, we still have lighting gaps across the city based on the lighting index we conducted a few years ago, and lighting, believe it or not, increases safety by over 30 percent.

And this is an investment that maintains impact over the years with minimal investment, and so this is why I'm pretty adamant on adding more police, or sorry, uh, instead of adding more police, we need to fully fund our lighting gaps, and I really really appreciate my colleagues' support on figuring out how we can secure additional funding for that.

And I know we'll discuss more of this um tomorrow.

And then I want to transition to the fire department.

Um just want to give a huge kudos to Chief Ralphstock.

You're doing a really, really extraordinary job.

Um I've been meeting with the team and they've just talked about all the amazing things that your department has done, so I commend you on that.

Um I'm pretty grateful to see that we're funding the needs assessment in this budget.

I think that it's very greatly needed and it's long time coming.

Um, and I want to make sure that our district to office is engaged as we put together the assessment parameters.

Because when we saw the recent California fires, I think that that just goes to show that it's very uh imperative that our community has all the tools that they need to protect themselves, their loved ones, their pets and their homes.

Um but I did have a question.

I'm very curious why the work hours for EMS workers varies greatly from the firefighters.

Um I know EMS works 24 hours on and 72 off, but firefighters work 24 and 48 48 hours off.

I just want to know why there's a difference.

Well, the EMS shift has four shifts, the A, B, D, and C and FIRER has uh three shifts.

So um it's been like that since well before I even got in the fire department.

Thank you.

Yes, appreciate that perfectly.

That's one of the things that we will certainly look at with the needs assessment.

Um, as President Jones mentioned, I think it's important to look at all the options and and do what whatever it is feasible and then whatever is best for the for the members as well.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Thank you.

Okay, yes.

Um yeah, so I'm I'm definitely hoping that we can just review that just a little bit more.

Um, and then of course, uh just extending the gratitude.

Um, I know earlier this February, the fire department and some of our council offices uh work together to identify neighbors who are in need of fire alarms and carbon monoxide alarm replacements or installations.

Um I know the firefighters also canvassed those neighborhoods and met with people in their homes to install, and I thought that this was really really awesome initiative, and it should definitely be continued and expanded.

Um, and I know our offices donated some of those uh devices, uh, which they were gladly to do, which is awesome.

Uh, but I would really like to see some full funding in place when it comes to the budget.

And I know Via Gran talked a little bit on this about um the drones.

I guess I want to know how we're storing data from those drones.

Do we have any policy in place to protect public privacy for any data that's collected and also what entities are allowed to access this data?

Do you have that information or yes?

Can we probably get that?

I actually uh looked into different platforms and decided that we would pick piggyback off of PD.

So they would handle not you know, task them with handling and but that similar to the way they handle their um and and retention, you know, periods, we would follow suit.

Okay.

Yes, of course.

Thank you.

Thank you, Craig.

Uh, insert technology questions, yeah.

Fire there.

So Craig Hopkins on the chief information officer.

I just wanted to let you know, and in general, as we work with the drones and both fire and PD and in other places, all data is city owned data, all works with our con our vendors that are under contract with us, and the IT shop is responsible for supporting them to make sure that that privacy stays in place.

Ah, okay, awesome.

Thank you.

Appreciate that clarification.

Um, and then with the municipal court, I know that there's double magistration.

Um, I know we kind of touched base on that.

Um, but yeah, I think I'm just really looking forward to um you know figuring that out under the committee.

So I look forward to reviewing that process very soon.

Um, but I think that's all that I have.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilman, you uh raised a really good question.

Uh, Mr.

Hopkins, can I ask the uh in this era of the importance of privacy?

Uh, is that drone footage uh susceptible to open records requests?

That is not my area of expertise, ma'am.

Camilla Communal City Attorney's Office short answer, yes.

Thank you.

Because it raises a really good point about how we may um help our community understand uh in this age as we are trying to use technology smartly, um, efforts they may or may not be able to uh to take to protect their privacy.

Um, Councilwoman Castillo.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you to both chiefs as well as Judge Obedo and uh Maria and Jesse for the presentation.

Uh the fire department.

Grateful to see that there will be the additional fire squad, but hearing the conversation around the expansive growth of the city as well as the potential density that we're going to see downtown.

Uh I think we should uh and I believe Councilman Mark White has proposed this uh during several meetings ago, but how we can explore how the high density downtown may impact response times, right?

And we've seen in the presentation that we're already seeing uh response times increase, and a lot has to do with the growth of the city.

But how can we plan for a potential sports district uh to ensure that as we build more housing and/or that sports district that the surrounding areas that those fire stations service will be able to keep response times down?

So that's something that I would like this to explore.

And then uh extremely grateful for Joe walking us through that component in terms of what the different shifts can look like as well as the impact that it has on the worker.

Um, in terms of the uh analysis that's going to take place, uh, that's something I'm looking forward to see.

But I also want to ensure that we continue to move those uh components forward, whatever the analysis demonstrates that it's not another analysis that uh we don't necessarily move forward in terms of what the recommendations are, whether it's equipment, staffing, or whatever the case may be.

Um but in terms of the uh fire station 33, really excited that we are past the land acquisition component.

Uh and one of the expectations that I have is when we move towards design that we can include uh local 624 to share, you know, what works best for the the the worker in terms of the space and what it looks like and a concern, right?

Uh and Joe hit on it, right?

We've seen fire station 33 on a presentation since 2022, uh, and I want to ensure that we continue to move these uh capital projects forward, uh, because that's the point uh Joe raised, right?

These aren't additional, uh, it's replacements, and we need to make sure that we're moving forward with that commitment of retrofitting, rebuilding, whatever the case may be with uh our fire stations.

Um with the conversation around public safety as a whole, and I mention this every time, whether it's a neighborhood association, our safe officers are bombarded with questions and concerns regarding uh encampments and vacant structures.

And my concern is is that we're setting the expectation that our safe officers are social workers, uh they're uh connecting folks to rehabilitation services.

Our expectation is that they're activating that vacant lot, and I feel like we're kind of you know relying them on how teachers are expected to solve uh everything uh in society.

And my concern is if we don't continue to prioritize the recommendations with what I'll call the hotspot study in terms of the following phases of vacant lot activation and or increased lighting, and that we'll continue to find ourselves in the same position with the same public safety concerns because uh the mayor is asking me what I anticipate to hear uh at our budget town hall, and I believe typically the standard is concerns around vacant structures and vacant lots, right?

They serves serve as a host of uh a majority of public safety concerns, public health concerns, and so much more.

And if we fail to invest in those public safety components within those plans, uh we'll continue to have the same concerns from communities.

So with the work that Maria and Jesse are doing, grateful for that.

But I also didn't see in the presentation the line items, and I know it overlaps with other departments, but how are we supplementing those requests, whether it's activating uh vacant lots, if it's increased lighting, um, how are we earmarking funding to go towards the the hot spots and or the areas with the good within the good neighbor program?

Um, and then again, in terms of with our safe officers, uh, with the good neighbor program, we do see a high concentration within the the West Side, whether it's district five, and I believe there's opportunity for us with the officers that will be hired to help tackle some of these areas where we are seeing a high concentration uh of issues, whether it's um continuing to work with code enforcement, and I know that work is taking place, um, but ultimately given that D5 has more than double uh than the majority of council districts, we do uh district five residents do deserve a more concentrated support to ensure that we're seeing uh their quality of life improve, right?

So that's something that I would like to see.

And then with the components around, it's on slide 22.

Uh around the new technology, prior to us taking action on the budget, Craig, I would like to get uh a briefing in terms of who has access to the data because uh my understanding is it can be compromised, like like anything else.

Um, but I also want to know in terms of the AI application for writing reports, what type of information will be put into this AI generator?

Do we already have that detailed?

So, if I may, all of these on the slide right now are research and prototypes.

So I want to be really clear.

We are not in production environments, we're not out there doing this in the field at this time.

But that'll be part of our research.

We'll be able to talk about those questions that you have.

Okay, thank you, because uh I I do have concern in terms of just the the liberty to exist in society without having your face scan and monitored uploaded to a database that can potentially be monitored, uh, and how we may be innovating on people's privacy uh in practice with these uh efficiency tools.

So um with the automated police writing tool, right?

What type of private information is a domestic violence victim putting in or giving to the police officer that will then be put into this dashboard to produce a report?

So a lot of questions, but if we could just set up that briefing before taking action, I'd appreciate it.

Absolutely.

All right, thank you.

Um, and then let's see.

And what he's encouraging, and I know he didn't have an opportunity to work with PD to analyze what that process looks like.

Um, but I do believe there would be uh value, and I know this is work that you are doing, um, but to continue to have um that that relationship with the county and look at that study on ways we can potentially address some of this uh duplication of work, right?

I know you mentioned uh on the county's end they're doing a step that you know you are taking care of how how we can better coordinate because when I look at the AI uh recommendation to reduce response times so that way our officers can track their reports, go back out into the field.

Um, what Dr.

Tesla and other scholars have found is when you reduce that double magistrative process, it provides the officer a shorter time frame uh in terms of go being down at the magistrate to go back out into the field, right?

So I think there's more opportunity in terms of efficiencies.

Did you have something add?

No, well, um have have you read that report?

Yes, councilwoman, the the part that had to do with magistration.

Yes, and we've met with Dr.

Tess as well.

Okay.

I I felt that it seriously lacked in data.

I I I really felt that there was not a lot of data to support the answers that that they gave.

Um but uh you know, but we will continue to to work to see how we can improve efficiencies and how we can work with the county to cut down those wait times, definitely.

All right, thank you.

And I would like to get um again before we take action on the budget as well.

If we could sit down in terms of what that study is, what it's recommending, and then also where there may be conflicting recommendations, but how we could just streamline that process because ultimately it's about how can we ensure that uh we're not having um officers down at the magistrate process for longer periods of time when they can be back out in the field, right?

Similar to the recommendation with the AI report component.

So um just how we can better understand which efficiencies would you recommend we move forward from that study, and then where you see there may be missing data.

And I understand within the study he mentions that he didn't have an opportunity to tour uh the San Antonio Mag or meet with PD, so that's why there's a lack of data is because he wasn't allowed access to it.

I I was never asked to uh to tour directly by him.

Um, and I think it would be helpful as well if um because it would help me when I have to address anything with the judges, it would be helpful to know if there is information lacking in police reports, um how often that happens, when did it happen, when is the last time it happened?

Um a lot of the answers were well, it happens all the time, and they never, and we always so I'd like a lot more information so that I know when I'm talking to the judges, and Fred is addressing these uh issues with MAG staff.

I want to know how often it's happening and when the last time it's happened it has happened.

So that's what I'm talking about when I say that I feel like that report seriously lacked in data.

I just couldn't imagine giving this body those types of answers.

That's all I'm saying.

Councilwoman, I'll I'll coordinate that briefing and I'll and I'll make sure that um that um we're incorporating the police department in that in that conversation with you.

All right, thank you.

And uh just again, always kudos to the union team for the Terency court as well as uh the warrant resolution workshops.

Um I think the numbers that you present show that they are impactful, and again, I'm always impressed with the ways in which your team provides wraparound services to the families that are going to that Trinity court uh and providing our youth with an opportunity and their parents as well uh to get connected to services and get back on the right track.

Uh, this is something that's uh um very valued in our district, and I've shared with you why.

Um, and just want to thank you on ask that y'all just continue to do that great work with um San Antonio residents.

And lastly, that's all Dr.

Judge.

Thank you.

Uh lastly, if we're all making our ask for facilities to potentially research, I think there would be value in conducting a study to see how we can potentially rebuild and/or retrofit uh the central substation.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilman Mungia, Chair Mungia.

Thank you.

Um couple notes on for the fire.

Um, I appreciate, I mean, it's just a little surprising to me about the 80-20, how much you do in medical.

Um, you know, I've certainly had family that has utilized that, uh, and that was for um low sugar diabetic reasons, so I can only imagine the other types of calls that are happening.

And so the mayor's point earlier was a really good point about that data and where that is that they're seeking medical help because I think that will help identify health care gaps.

Of course, it's well documented, and the south side of San Antonio, there is only one open hospital south of 90.

Um, and so I know the last council, my predecessor helped to get an extra unit to help facilitate the the lack of uh the closure of the hospital.

Um but that's still very concerning that the the geographically half of the city is tied to that.

Of course, we know that puts a strain on every other hospital in the city of San Antonio, so uh more work to do on that.

Um support the additional squads and the enhanced squads, I think that's a great benefit, especially to help address some of these uh medical calls that you're you're doing is really good.

Um very happy about fire station 52, which is a trailer.

I've been to every fire station in District 4.

Um it's a mobile trailer, so I'm glad that we're we're breaking ground on that and moving forward.

Um also the needs assessment.

I I heard some of the you know conversation that Councilman Spears had uh with Mr.

Jones, and I agree that you know geographically speaking, we need to look at that also.

Of course, uh D4 and D3 are growing, but as we are um requiring higher density in certain areas, not just downtown, but San Pedro, the north-south line, east and west, the TOD, right?

That requires high density.

Um so there are measurable, there's areas we could we can predict will have greater density, so we need to kind of put that in the assessment also.

Um when it comes to SAPD, um, and anyone can answer this.

What are the the number of current officer vacancies in the department?

What do we got, Rick?

Councilman Rick Riley, I'm the assistant director for SAPD.

As of the 15th of August, it was 40.

Uh, we've got some retirements uh pending this week, so it may change by the end of the week.

Okay, so you have 40 vacancies right now.

Okay, good to know.

Um, and you know, I do have uh quite a bit of questions on the proactive policing.

Um Chief McManus, if you could come up, please.

I know you you talked a lot about the 6040 plan that was adopted by previous council.

What where were those numbers based on?

Why wasn't it 7030, 80-20?

What was the 60-40 number for?

We did a staffing study.

You know, for years we were getting, you know, how many police officers do you need, how many police officers do you need, and it was based on no data.

So we got a staffing study done, and uh the um the study showed that we needed 360 officers to get to a 60-40 ratio.

So that's how we got that based on the staffing study.

But why the 60-40 ratio?

That the assessment that you did say that that's the best thing to have is 6040.

Well, I think I think keeping within keeping our staffing numbers within a certain range, that 60-40 was ideal.

Yeah, Maudia, did you want to add something?

Sure.

Councilman, when we did the study um back in 2023, we looked at different patrol staffing models um that are used across the country, a per capita number, you probably heard number of officers per thousand, minimum staffing, what are needed to be able to provide services to the community depending on the the staffing needs of a department.

Um budget allocations.

There's some cities that may um just add certain number of officers per year based on their budget, and then there's a workload-based based on that analysis.

We felt that the best fit for San Antonio was to base it on workload.

So as part of that um analysis and based on the work that the consultant had done for other police department, the 40-60 percent was a best practice that we found in in other police departments, and and that's what we recommended to the council.

Sure.

And that 6040, 460, whatever you want to call it, that is just in patrol.

That is not measured across all SAPD units.

That is correct.

Yes, just patrol.

So do you know what the average proactive reactive percentage is for the entire department?

No, and and the reason for that is that the work is different of the different units.

For instance, uh the investigative units, they have different workloads and different standards.

Uh we have our canine unit, our uh traffic units, so if every unit is different to utilize the same methodology.

Absolutely.

And you know, Chief, something you said earlier about um, you know, the way to I forgot what the question was, but you said the way to address it is to not take as many calls or to increase staff, right?

So correct me if I'm wrong, having some specialized units like the core team, like Save, those units do help reduce calls that go to patrol ultimately.

Yes.

Okay.

So why wouldn't we help identify additions to those particular units like core like SAVE and also help achieve your 6040 goal uh that's in your professional opinion for patrol?

Yeah, I don't know what what adding, you know, how many more officers adding to either SA core or SAFE?

I don't know what that ratio would do to the to the uh reduced calls.

So I I don't know if that can answer your question.

Yeah, I think it it's a long-term question for sure.

Uh but you know, I think for most of us, we are more familiar with the work of SAFE and what they do, and that type of proactive work that really addresses chronic neighborhood issues with single properties.

Um, and I think that's very valuable.

I uh when it comes to patrol and and how you're measuring 6040.

Are you able to segregate what they are doing that is based on generated from a call versus what they're doing on their proactive time?

What what they do in their proactive time is what they they hear from the neighborhoods, what kind of complaints they have, what kind of of direction they get from their from their supervisors.

That's how all that is worked out about about what they're doing.

But you but you're documenting what work is actually happening in proactive time.

I'm sorry, saying you're at you're documenting what actual work is happening in proactive time?

Yes.

So you can tell me what calls that was that were made or what tickets they issued or what arrests they made in proactive time.

Yes.

And if if I may, um Chief, and and we're happy to do a follow-up on that, uh, councilman.

But just to give you an idea what we're talking about, oh, the 1.8 million calls for service that uh we share earlier in the presentation, roughly about 10% is uh uh done on a proactive basis.

So we have those calls documented so we can provide that in the follow-up memo.

Thank you.

Um and so for the problem-oriented policing, um you mentioned they were apartments, but they're they're only apartments because that is is a high volume call area, right?

That's where the that's where they the highest call volume was right.

So it's not just the fact that they're apartments if you're going that is just based on the calls that you're getting from those areas.

Correct.

Okay, great.

Um, and just on a facility question, are there any um potential upgrades that you're thinking of doing to the Mayfield substation or plans for that substation?

Let's also say no, sir.

Not at the time, no sir.

Okay.

Not at this time.

Yeah, I've been there many times, and and they they host community meetings there, and it feels like walking into a 90s movie uh from a police state substation.

So just a long-term thing.

So I appreciate it.

I understand, yeah.

Uh so yeah, just a couple questions on municipal court, and I'll start off by saying last month or so um there was a 19-year-old kid who was arrested on a traffic stop.

He tried to flee the scene of the traffic stop, he ended up getting arrested.

19 years old, he had five active felony warrants.

And I brought this up at a meeting in my district, and one of my residents who I know really well used to be a counselor at Southwest ISD.

Come to find out that kid was in those types of programs that were at risk youth, starting from middle school.

So that's one thing that I I'm gonna be looking into, and I hope you know we're gonna have a tour soon, and however I can help with the truancy situation, but I just see the correlation in my district with kids that are are slipping through the cracks in school, and somewhere down the line have these um horrible situations happen to them.

Um course there's personal accountability, but you know, I just wonder what would happen if they had had something for them early on.

And so I hope that we can discuss that at the education committee.

Uh and I do agree with the the mayor's point earlier about putting council districts with that those school districts because of course I have North Side ISD and district seven has north side ISD, right?

And and they're probably more southern uh south of 90 that you have those situations.

Um I hope and I met with every superintendent of my school district and my district, three of them, and I did talk about true and see to see how we can help foster that with the city and identify those kids very early on to make some sort of changes, and so um more work on that.

But quick question what percentage of cases that you have coming to municipal court that are dismissed?

You had a dismissal number, but I didn't see a percentage attached to that.

We would have to get that uh we would have to get you that information at a later date.

And then there's different types of dismissals.

So are you just looking at dismissals overall?

Are you looking for a specific type of dismissal?

We can we can reach out to your office to find out exactly what it is that you sure.

I think having all those different types, like so the general number plus the different categories, um, just to know, and so what's happened, and here's another question for you.

So let's say you have somebody that goes to your court and they get a ticket for ACS.

Um, and you know, within the past year or two, they've had multiple tickets.

When that current ticket gets to a judge, are they able to see the history of that of that individual's tickets at municipal court?

Yes.

They are.

Yes.

And if you're referring specifically to ACS cases, if it's filed as a criminal case, an ACS officer is present at those dockets so that they can also give any type of background.

The city attorney makes a recommendation.

Uh so there's a few eyes on those cases in that court.

And so for all those cases, you do have access to history.

Yes.

Okay.

Thank you for that.

You're welcome.

Those are all my questions.

Uh Chair Gulban.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um first of all, I just want to say thank you, of course, for all the folks who presented today.

Uh there's an important conversations we're having, and I really appreciate all the the conversations we've been having today.

Um I'm sorry with fire um and EMS.

I know we talked a bit about response time, so I'm gonna leave that where it is, but I wanted to ask this kind of extends to police too.

I know there's reductions in overtime.

I wanted to ask a bit more question of what that I know said no impact on services necessarily, but what was the overtime paying for to begin with?

What were those calls being made that required the overtime?

That there's types of services being asked for.

What did that look like?

Well, it really is overall management and reducing wherever we can.

We have new leadership in place, especially over um divisions that you know.

I mean, they they um bring in a lot of inventory and and things like that.

So they're round-the-clock operations, um, and I'm specifically talking about services.

Uh we have also uh implemented a new position for MIH so that they can focus.

So really drilling down into certain specific areas, programs, or divisions that generate a lot of overtime and seeing how and where we can cut back.

Um but yeah, we've already identified some items, and we also um had um an audit.

So, you know, I mean, we're we're taking that information and um that's gonna be helpful moving forward so we can be more efficient.

Yeah, thank you so much.

That's helpful just to think about uh, of course, we all know the impact of staffing, right?

And just what it can do to help reduce bigger costs, like over time.

And so I'm glad to hear we're seeing that, especially with the MIH piece.

I want to echo uh what I've heard from some of my council colleagues about MIH and its role in addressing the kind of long-term issues that we see in our community, especially with the medical calls.

Um looking at that and want to figure out ways that we can continue supporting not only that unit but other uh squad units as well to make sure that they are well equipped to really get the response times ideally a little bit lower, um, as well as uh just making sure we're reducing that burn as much as we can.

We're reducing that overtime as much as we can so that these folks are able to do their jobs well, have the resources they need to do that the jobs well, uh you know, second hand can help with that.

And so just want to echo those pieces that we've been talking about today.

Um I think that's all my question on the fire EMS, so thank you for that.

Okay, of course.

The the biggest I would say the biggest driver for overtime is minimum staffing.

So um, and that's gonna entail you know a uh department-wide policy review and just enforcement of those policies.

I think that will help quite a bit as well.

Thank you.

Okay, of course.

Eric, I was just gonna add for context the the uh the fire department's overtime budget is 38.2 million dollars.

So as the chief mentioned, the majority of that is being driven by staffing requirements that we place on the stations as well as uh the shifts that the firefighters and paramedics work uh under the FLSA federal requirements, they get a certain amount of overtime in every in every uh paycheck.

I see.

And so I I mean I guess that's where I come with it.

Same conversation I've had about budget goals.

I think I think we're all trying to figure out right ways to reduce cost and reduce uh the deficit that we're facing.

Uh I mean it seems to just make sense, right?

Logically that we if we have more staffing, it's of course upfront costs, but overall reduces the overtime pieces, and so I think as we're looking long term, not only for this budget, but going forward that we're looking at those pieces.

I understand it's gonna impact the rest of the budget, right?

Um but if it means that we're saving costs in the long run, I say that's to do it.

Let's figure out ways that we can reduce that over time, make sure that we're reducing burnout and also delivering the services our residents are asking for.

Um police, um I wanted to ask how many uh staff members are part of each SA core team.

Good afternoon.

We've got 17 uniformed police officers on for the across the three teams, and Jesse can talk about clinicians.

We have about 21 clinicians.

Um the team, just to be clear, it's an MIH medic, a mental health unit officer, and a CHCS clinician that respond, um they rotate at different times throughout the day depending on their staffing, and that would be across the three areas.

Those 21 clinicians follow um to the response.

Some of them are during response, and some of them are dedicated to follow-up services.

Okay, got it.

Thank you.

I just wanted to kind of get those numbers down just because I I think it's important as we're talking about staffing, of course, we were expanding that piece as much as we can to really address those pieces that Councilman Gear raised, right?

Seeing how we can get the underlying issues addressed and therefore hopefully reduce the other pieces too uh that are required for the emergency calls, right?

These still are emergency calls ultimately, uh, but they can hopefully also catch uh future emergencies as well.

Um I'm gonna kind of bounce around between this because it's just while we're on the topic about mental health and essay core.

Um I'm not gonna call you up on the magistration piece, uh, but I did want to say that I would like to have a conversation about that later on, um, just as a briefing with us about what that can look like.

Um I understand you mentioned how long magistration process has been under the city for a while and then recently shifted um with Bear County, and so I want to figure out what that looks like for us as a city to work with the Bear County uh to address those pieces.

Something I really want to focus in on the community health committee is figuring out a mental health diversion center and working with of course public safety committee, municipal court advisory committee to get those pieces rolling.

I think that'll be a key component.

Um but we'll have the conversations as those come up.

So especially wanna see too what those cost savings can look like uh potentially, right?

But not only with municipal courts, but also with police as well.

Um we're gonna be expanding our DHS outreach workers, or if if we're gonna be expanding um both that one and MIH, I think it's important that we're figuring out ways to look at the back end systems too to really address the pieces that we're reaching out to folks about.

So I'm gonna say thank you for that conversation.

We'll we'll have that conversation later.

We'll look forward to it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um let me see here.

I wanted to also talk a bit about the AI piece within the police presentation.

Um can you walk me through what the uh just generally what the AI powered means within the kind of cameras and stuff?

Uh is it constantly screening the analysis?

What are they looking for?

What does that look like?

And I know again it's not fully out there, right?

But what is the thing that we're looking at doing with them?

So um from a technology component, there's a couple of things we're doing.

One is the ability to bring multiple cameras and multiple camera networks into one platform.

I see.

So it's not just a camera on a street, it's a network of cameras and how you bring them together.

All the cameras are different, have different capabilities, and it comes to one place.

Uh the second thing was to test out what we call AI events.

So can the can the AI tool detect an event before the human being sees it on the screen, or somebody was to call it in on a 9-1-1 call.

So a person walking with a gun on the street or a loud crowd getting together on a street.

So we're testing those, that technology.

That's the real AI component that is able to say we can proactively see an event before a human being even sees it.

And then the last part of it is a little bit more investigative, but it allows them to actually go back into previous video, not real-time live video, and look for things, a yellow backpack, an umbrella, things like that as well.

So those are how we're using it with multiple cameras in the in the corridor right now.

We're prototyping that.

I see.

That's helpful.

Um I guess that sticks to the points that we've kind of heard today about um privacy concerns as well as I think just implicit bias, regardless, right?

Um I think it's why we're testing it too, Steve, what that looks like.

Um I'd imagine with uh different groups of crowds, we'll get different responses of what the emergency could be, or if it is an emergency or not.

Um so I'd like to see what is produced from this, of course, as it as it goes on.

Um particularly with uh that implicit bias.

If there is a pr uh large crowd, or there is a person with a gun in a uh constitutional carry state, right?

What is what are we looking for to say that this is an emergency or this is a crisis, or this could be a potential issue.

Um so I think that's just something we'll work out as we go through.

Um and if I may sure it's to it, the intent is to assist the human being, right?

Not to replace the human being.

So the human being has to watch lots of screens and lots of cameras.

If the system is out able to notify them to go to the screen and act upon something, then the human being takes the action.

I see intent.

That's helpful.

Yeah, okay.

Thank you.

Yep.

And I think can I make sure I'm not missing anything here.

These are all my comments for now.

Thank you.

Chair Corr.

Thank you, Mayor.

I just wanted to chime back in on a couple of items that had been discussed.

So I know some of my council colleagues talked about the decrease in response time to better increase public safety.

And I wanted to just reiterate that adding those additional officers like were mentioned for SA Corps and our other additional programs, our safe programs, don't necessarily address the issue that some of us were talking about.

So the ideas around speeding.

I don't know if you guys get this a lot, but so many of my residents talked to me about speeding.

We actually had to pull two of our officers last week to go to a spot where they're doing a detour because of the Castle Hills construction so that they could check on residential speeding.

There's a lot of accountability issues that are not top priority for our patrol.

And so they're not going to actually try to get out there, even if we add the additional 25 police officers.

And so I think one of the things we need to think about is more innovative ways to actually add that staff.

That there's it's so hard to get enforcement out for those issues because they're not high priority calls, and they're not where we want to see our patrol officers spending time.

So that's something that I think we can continue to explore in public safety as well.

So wanted to say that I see, and we all kind of see a little bit of a different of those enforcements like UC 18 Wheeler, I see parking, um, some folks may see something different, speeding, et cetera.

So it looks a little different across the city, but we all have similar enforcement issues that I think we can work creatively to figure out uh other solutions as well to address those.

So I wanted to add that.

Um in addition, I wanted to talk just a little bit about the technology piece, and um that's sometimes scary for folks, and I we talk about in schools, you know.

I'm I always give the school analogy where you can't avoid technology completely in schools anymore.

We have to teach students how to be safe users of technology, and if we just avoid it, we're actually missing an opportunity to truly individualize instruction for students.

And I think that's similar in the situation where technology can be used in a powerful way to help us, but it can also be used as a deterrent to the outcome we're actually trying to get to.

So I wanted to echo some of the worries that my colleagues have mentioned and encourage us to think very strategically about this pilot.

The downtown pilot was supposed to be that a pilot to figure out exactly what kind of what works and what didn't.

I actually so I think there's going to be a lot of learning from it, and we we have to figure out what a policy looks like for us, and I'm sure together we can figure out what we want to implement on how we use that, who monitors it, and how that affects the policing going forward.

I always say our city, we have built done a lot of work to build positive trust with our police department and our community.

We have more work to do in that area, but we don't want to inadvertently do anything that would deteriorate that trust.

So I wanted to make that uh echo that comment.

And then the last thing I want to say just about street lights, and I guess we'll have a lot more opportunities to talk about streetlights is I didn't realize that our gap analysis was a streetlight every 600 feet.

And when you look up, we're doing uh an analysis on safe passageway to schools, which is looking up a quarter mile radius to each school and how a student gets there.

The fo researchers and evidence says that the actual ideal for residential passageway for streetlights is anywhere between 100 to 150 feet.

So all that to say we have a really great need.

I know this was a starting point for us, but I think there's a lot more work we can do in that aspect.

Okay, thank you, Mayor.

Uh Chair Viewan.

Thank you, Mayor.

So before I I I uh talk about municipal courts, I do want to state that um, because I I heard this mentioned, and as we look at the plan Mania for the uh substations, that I in my career I'd been to every single substation, and there is no rebuild.

We need new substations.

They are too old and outdated and do not have the energy source.

So I just wanted to echo if we want to start with Mayfield, let's go ahead.

But it it needs to be new.

Um so I I want to kind of just talk on Judge Obledo and uh municipal court clerk um Garcia, and I call them Fred and Carla.

But uh I want to thank them.

The one thing uh council colleagues that you have is I've brought the uh team and the judges out to my district to have conversations about what ACS does, what the judges do, how the process goes.

So I do want to talk a little about um first time a diversion or alternative programs for all the courts.

Do we have that and are we looking at expanding that as we move forward in some of these cases?

Specifically for juveniles, we we we have that.

There was a new law that took effect for offenses that occurred on or after January 1st, 2025.

So instead of a formal prosecution, there is a uh diversion agreement that is made with the child and the parent that contains certain conditions, and it's individualized depending on the the child's needs.

And as long as they satisfactorily complete that diversion agreement, then no formal charges are ever filed.

Thank you.

And I want to thank you for doing that.

But as we talk about other cases and and you can sit if you want, because this is just mainly uh points is what I want to do is I think as a council we need to look at the repeat offenders, whether it's the ACS case, the uh code enforcement cases, we have repeat offenders, and we need a way to let the judges know this is a repeat offender.

They come all um with their sad story about I have a medical condition, I had a heart attack, and the heart attack, my residents will tell me, well, he had a heart attack, and they said it was four years ago.

So I think we need to have those conversations because as I looked and I asked it for the 2025 numbers on the cases, what we had in terms of filing cases and criminal cases is that there is a a remainder of over 188,000 out there that we kind of need to we kind of need to collect on the criminal cases, and then um an amount on the civil cases of over one million.

And I think that is one thing we need to Eric task about how we go out there and do that and how do we c recover those fines because especially with the repeat offenders, if they're feeling like there is no accountability, they're just going to continue repeating the the bad actions.

And I will always use the case of uh and I wish Mike was here with the code team is parking on parking in your front yard, and they can get cited for that numerous times, they can get a number of fines, and they'll just never they'll never pay them.

And so I think that's where as we move forward, how do we go out, what is left out there, and how do we bring that back to uh our municipal court and the funds as we move forward and we try and be uh innovative.

So I look forward to having these conversations in in committee.

I want to commend the judges for their efforts, but I do think part of it is an information and an education process to uh the council districts to know what course of action they can take and how we can communicate best to the municipal court judges is this is this is an ongoing problem, and this is what we'd like to see.

And then if we could work as as a committee to see where we get to that threshold where it's like this the uh an out-of-town landlord, that's the other out-of-town landlords who refuse to clean up their um their vacant lot or their property.

When do we when do we as a city kind of begin to take action and move forward on those cases?

So thank you.

Thank you for always doing a great job and coming out.

And I I look forward to all the new council members getting to know them very well and bringing them out to your districts because it's always it's always a good time.

So um thank you very much.

Um council, uh, council member spears.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

Um councilman uh Garcia Angiano.

Okay, thank you, Mayor.

I just wanted to go back to the staffing study that was mentioned earlier regarding the police.

Um so for my understanding, I know that the author didn't complete the study because he passed.

Um I just I I guess I wanted to see if we found another consultant to finish that study with actual proven data.

Um, and are we essentially just relying on an incomplete study?

Councilman, the study was completed by the consultant.

We presented um the information that that uh he provided to us back to the council in April of 2023.

Uh he the analysis was done, the staff met with him.

Um we have the methodology in terms of what he used, the calls for service.

He looked at the different distribution of our resources across the different substations.

So all that methodology was part of the information that he provided to us.

He just didn't have the opportunity to put it in a report in the same way that he had done for other law enforcement agencies.

But in terms of his analysis that we were able to obtain, that's how we base our recommendation to the council.

Thank you for clarifying.

Appreciate that.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay, I've got a couple of follow-up questions based on the good questions and comments of my colleagues.

Chief Chief McManus, uh, is our officer per capita ratio on par with other major Texas cities?

Um higher, are we lower?

It's uh probably just about right in the middle.

Okay.

Okay.

Um in the follow-up memo, we can uh we can pull that data for the other cities.

I appreciate that.

Thank you.

Um and Chief, the the um welcome you just kind of illuminating some of those um areas um maybe that are emerging public safety concerns um as you see them.

I mean, we talked frankly about kind of the more uh kind of run-of-the-mill issues, but are there kind of public safety issues on the that are that are um emerging that your officers that you think some of your officers may need additional training for or um anything as we're kind of looking at a little bit further that would help you on and your officers on day-to-day?

Yeah, no, Mayor.

I don't I don't see any right now.

Um course our fusion center looks out for those emerging trends.

Okay.

Um chief, one thing I I would appreciate.

Um I know uh we were at the um LGBTQ town hall uh that you were kind enough to uh to host and answer their questions.

I'd I'd appreciate a written product that outlines how your budget um responds to some of the um issues that they identified uh that evening and that are outlined as well in that Trinity report.

Yes, ma'am.

Um Judge Obleto.

Thank you, Chief.

Um one of the things I asked the municipal um court counsel committee to to look at is um whether or not we're adequately supporting our members of our community that either have behavioral or mental health um challenges or have special needs as they navigate the legal system.

Um can you speak to your assessment of how well we support those individuals now and if there are additional whether you're adequately resourced uh to to provide that we uh as I mentioned, we do have a community court where we work with a lot of our community partners that will uh provide those types of services, and a lot of times we just want individuals that are chart that are unhoused that are charged with class C misdemeanors to volunteer voluntarily appear in court.

It has to be something that they want to do.

Um and we try not to have law enforcement involved, we actually try to work with other community partners.

As I mentioned, we work with the second chance for success through the Bear County District Attorney's Office so that any higher level offenses and class C misdemeanors are run concurrently.

Um with our juvenile services, that is where we are really tackling the type of issues that you are talking about.

That's where our juvenile case managers work directly with students and families and uh young offenders and their families and the pro to help provide those services that they need.

Um the problem though is there's not a lot of low-cost or free services in San Antonio, and if there are any, there's usually a long waiting list, and that's one of the challenges that we're seeing in our domestic violence court.

Um part of a probation for a domestic violence offense includes counseling, mental health services, substance abuse problems, uh issues, um, but a lot of times county and the county courts are also using those same organizations for their people that are on probation.

So there's long waiting lists, there's sometimes no room for them.

Um so we are trying to identify those people, and that's why we have so many specialty courts so we can spend a little bit more time with folks.

Okay.

Yeah, I appreciate that.

I know one of the concerns of uh some of my colleagues and myself is the way in which nonprofits some of the nonprofits are are funded.

And so if we know that some of these nonprofits though are directly meeting a need as you've just identified, then we want to understand how we're prioritizing those in light of other services they may be providing.

Eric, um, if you'd help us understand those nonprofits that are helping that that are receiving city funds that are actually helping them with the municipal process, that'd be helpful for us.

Specifically through that that municipal court process.

Correct.

Yeah, thank you.

Okay.

Thank you.

Um Eric, I think I think what you're hearing from my colleagues and certainly I would appreciate is an additional staffing analysis that helps us understand more than just the patrol.

I think whether you talk about safe or or core, I think there's an appreciation that there's obviously an uh a connection between the ROI on those and how they may in fact decrease the workload that the chief has described uh is actually informing our staffing levels.

Have we looked at a staffing analysis for those other capabilities?

We have, Mayor, but um I would agree with you that that you know, in particular um investigations are very different, you know, the metrics are very different.

How are what is our case closure look like?

Um the traffic unit, but that's something we could take a look at to come back to the council with how we do how we lay that out somewhere to how we're talking about approaching from the fire department um in those other areas of the of the police department.

The that of the 2800 police officers, we have 1,300 that are in patrol, roughly.

So you know the the majority of the department is doing other things, and I think we can uh come up with some alternatives for the council to consider.

I appreciate that.

Thank you.

Because I think um, and folks have have um I think talked around it, but I want to speak directly to it.

This assumption of more cops faster, the assumption of that is that the things that are defunded in the course of getting there faster are not in fact increasing things that are making our community less safe, right?

That's a critical assumption of that argument.

Um the other thing, um, Eric, as we are talking about that tabletop exercise, I want to make sure when we talk about you know decreases in in services that we are incorporating and testing again our assumptions around public safety's ability to respond also in those instances.

So, welcome uh Chief uh both chiefs' um contributions to that.

And then lastly, um when scheduling the the briefing um with uh Judge Obledo regarding the um uh double magistration, uh I think it'd be really helpful as uh judge you mentioned there not being sufficient data to support that gentleman's uh recommendations.

If you have data, if you have data that is conflicting of that, I'd certainly appreciate uh incorporating that into the presentation to the council.

Um and then lastly, I think um, you know, as I mentioned in my um my memo to my colleagues um in assigning council committees, you know, everybody's job, regardless of what their actual committee that they're on, we've got to do two things is we've got to think about our work in the context of reducing poverty and increasing our competitiveness, uh, economic competitiveness long term.

Um, hence the educational opportunities committee certainly does that.

Um but as the judge and and Maria rightly you know pointed out, the staffing is based on the workload.

So by reducing poverty, increasing economic opportunities, increasing economic economic competitiveness, we can help ourselves by reducing the workload, which actually then helps to reduce our public safety bill overall.

Okay.

Um thank you again to Chief Rostow, Chief Um Chief uh Chief McManus, um, as well as Judge Abletto for your for your comments.

Eric, did you have something you wanted to add?

I was just gonna add, Mayor, there's a number of follow-up items that came out of the meeting.

We will send that follow up memo with all the answers to you and the rest of the council by Friday close of business.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Okay.

Uh let's see here.

There being no further discussion, the time is now 5 19 p.m.

and the meeting is adjourned.

Thanks to everyone for coming.