Milford police present ComStat results, request six officers, new lieutenant and pay adjustments

Chief Cecilia Ash, chief of the Milford Police Department, told the Milford Public Safety Committee on May 14 that the department has launched a weekly ComStat process and is asking the city to add six officers, one additional detective and one lieutenant to stabilize patrol coverage and investigative capacity. "Our proposal is that we need to add, 6 officers to the staffing," Ash said during the presentation.

The request accompanies a detailed ComStat rollout led by John Martin, the department's crime analyst, which Ash said has helped the department clean up data and identify trends. "The idea with the ComStat is every Monday, every Monday morning, I look at the previous week's crime," John Martin said, describing the weekly 7-day, 28-day and year-to-date comparisons the department now uses to track Part I crimes and misdemeanor thefts.

Why it matters: Ash told the committee the city has grown about 20% in recent years and the department is seeing roughly a 5% year-over-year increase in calls for service. At the same time, she said response-time analysis shows it is taking officers longer to reach calls in four of five priority categories. Those trends, the chief said, make sustained, proactive policing harder without added staff or structural changes.

ComStat and deployment changes

Ash described a…