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Austin EMS reports lower vacancy rate, recruitment steps; public-safety dashboards previewed

Austin City Council Public Safety Committee · February 2, 2026
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

Chief Lukritz told the Public Safety Committee that Austin-Travis County EMS reduced its vacancy rate from a COVID-era peak and outlined recruitment and retention changes; the three public-safety departments previewed draft monthly dashboards to improve transparency on overtime, staffing and response performance.

Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services on Feb. 2 told the Public Safety Committee it has reduced vacancies since a COVID-era peak and is pursuing a mix of recruiting and retention strategies while the city's three public-safety departments unveiled first-draft dashboards intended to publish monthly staffing, overtime and operational metrics.

Chief Lukritz said the department saw vacancy rates spike during the pandemic and reach a 25.4% peak; he presented current slide figures showing the vacancy rate down to about 15.1% and noted a related slide that reported 602 filled positions out of 715 sworn positions (a 15.8% vacancy on that slide). He said department growth (many new authorized positions added since FY 2020),…

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