Robin Henderson, chief of staff for the Austin Police Department, told the Public Safety Commission on the department's quarterly report that auto thefts fell 29% from 2023 to 2024, a decline she attributed to a mix of community events, policy changes and targeted enforcement.

"There has been a dramatic decrease in our auto thefts from 2023 to 2024. There's been a 29% decrease," Henderson said, describing anti-theft events run with Hyundai, bait-car operations and updated recovery procedures.

The department said two Hyundai events distributed nearly 1,000 steering-wheel locks and provided 943 free anti-theft software upgrades. APD also described bait operations and a shoplifting enforcement effort run by the North Metro Tactical Team that the department said included five operations in November and December, 22 calls for service, roughly 32 arrests or citations and more than $12,000 in recovered merchandise.

Henderson also highlighted crime categories that rose. APD reported an 8% increase in kidnapping and abductions from 2023 to 2024 and a 24% rise versus a five-year mean. The department said much of that increase involves adult victims and family-violence components; Henderson said APD is being more intentional in investigating family-violence incidents that include unlawful restraint or movement of a victim.

The presentation turned to operations and staffing. Henderson said the department's sworn staffing stood at about 1,490 of 1,816 allocated positions, a 17.8% vacancy rate; civilian vacancies were about 6.2%, and emergency communications had roughly 18 unfilled positions (about a 6% vacancy rate). The department said the emergency communications vacancy rate has improved substantially since early 2023, when it approached 50%.

APD showed an uptick in average response time for priority-zero and priority-one calls to nearly 11 minutes in October before stabilizing in November. Commissioners asked whether officers' use of code 4 (indicating a scene is secured and no additional units are needed) was affecting response times. Henderson said supervisors monitor call status and may place units back in service when appropriate, but she said the department could not directly correlate code 4 usage to response-time changes because of the wide variation in call types and staffing assignments.

Henderson described a new commander promotional process negotiated as part of the recent meet-and-confer agreement with the Austin Police Association. The process will include a voluntary mentorship program for lieutenant candidates who want to promote to commander, a mandatory leadership curriculum, written and reading assignments, an assessment center administered by the contracted firm IO Solutions, an oral review panel and a probationary evaluation period for promoted commanders.

She reviewed recruiting and academy data: APD graduated two cadet classes this year (one with 39 cadets and another of roughly 50), said a cadet class that began in July (the 153rd) started with 61 people and currently has 36, and announced a new academy class that started the week of the meeting and is scheduled to graduate in August 2025 after beginning with 86 recruits. Henderson said a hiring cycle opened in late 2024 drew roughly 900 initial applicants.

Commissioners asked for additional follow-ups Henderson said she would provide, including comparative cadet graduation metrics against national or peer-city averages and the status of a proposed community advisory committee; Henderson said the list of proposed committee participants has been sent to Chief Davis, who wanted background before confirming appointees.

Action on the meeting agenda included a motion to approve minutes from the Nov. 4 regular meeting, but the commission paused approval because one commissioner who was absent would have been needed to reach the required six affirmative votes. The commission said it will revisit approval at a subsequent meeting.

The department provided standard-data backups and said it would circulate additional requested information following the presentation.

Ending

Commissioners said they would continue follow-up questions on staffing, response-time drivers and cadet outcomes at future meetings; APD said it would submit the additional data requested by the commission.