Austin Police report lower arrests, new downtown rapid response unit and mental-health pilot; sworn staffing remains strained

Robin Anderson, chief of staff for the Austin Police Department, delivered the department's quarterly report to the Public Safety Commission on the department's downtown safety pilot, mental‑health response plans, training and staffing.

Anderson said the department is piloting changes to the long‑running Sixth Street traffic closure and has created a downtown rapid response team (DART) to concentrate personnel in the downtown services area. "One thing that we learned is that once the congestion gets to a certain volume, we are then still closing down the streets ... there are factors and variables that dictate us shutting it down even that still remain in place on Fridays and Saturdays," Anderson said. She added that the pilot keeps primary westbound lanes open on Thursday through Saturday unless congestion or safety factors require closure.

The department has also installed temporary fencing and visual bollards to widen pedestrian pathways and is using overtime‑funded DWI officers and bike/foot patrols to increase traffic enforcement on weekends.

Nut graf: The pilot and the DART are intended to reduce harm and improve safety downtown while the department pursues a broader workload analysis to reshape deployment. The APD reported sharp declines in several measures within the…