New Public Safety director seeks AEDs, a program manager and staffing to expand oversight

Sean Dace, the city’s new public safety director, told the Board of Aldermen Budget Committee on May 6 he is seeking targeted additions to the Department of Public Safety budget: $25,000 to purchase seven Stryker automated external defibrillators (AEDs) for City Hall and restoration of a Program Manager II position to provide oversight of multiple programs across the department’s eight divisions.

Dace, a 35‑year St. Louis City Police Department veteran who retired as a major, said the department’s FY26 request totals roughly $1.3 million across funds and that most of the general fund request supports personnel. He said a portion of the department’s work is funded through local sales tax propositions (Prop P and Prop S) and that the department also receives the Justice Assistance Grant (JAG), which underwrites two criminal intelligence analyst positions in the Homicide Division.

Dace described the AED request as driven by two heart‑related incidents among city employees last year and by the lack of any AEDs in City Hall. The $25,000 request would buy seven Stryker units; Dace said the Stryker brand was chosen because it is the same brand used by Fire/EMS and would streamline patient care during transfers.

The Program Manager II role, Dace said, would centralize oversight for the many programs run by public safety’s eight divisions including building management and the city justice center and would increase “visibility and transparency” of processes and operations. The director also said the role would help the department shift from largely reactive responses to proactive program management.

Committee members pressed for details on several line items. Carletta Fielder, the department’s fiscal manager, said the Program Manager II had been posted and that the department had been actively interviewing but the position was removed from the proposed budget; she asked the committee to restore it if possible.

Aldermen asked about youth employment programming funded from sales tax proceeds (prop P). Dace said the department typically runs summer youth employment through a set of vendor contracts awarded by RFP and that the Prop P fund provides consistent annual support of roughly $1,000,000 for crime prevention programming; a computer error in summary tables caused an erroneous large fluctuation in the printed budget book but the ordinance still requires a $1,000,000 allocation.

Dace said the department is hiring for several vacant posts including a neighborhood stabilization commissioner and a violence prevention commissioner, and he identified the Justice Center as a near‑term operational priority that the committee will examine separately when corrections leadership appears.

He also noted an increase in the Justice Center budget driven in part by an increase in inmate health contract costs and personnel service requests, but said final staffing counts were to be firmed up when the corrections division appears before the committee.

No votes were taken on the public safety department request on May 6. Several aldermen welcomed Dace’s emphasis on program oversight and his stated intent to work regionally with law‑enforcement and public‑safety partners to improve recruitment and retention.