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City staff weigh alternate response options for low‑priority calls as council weighs labor and liability implications
Summary
A city presentation analyzed options—retired officers, contractors, civilian expediters, online self‑reporting and code enforcement—to handle minor traffic accidents, lost property, noise and parking calls. Staff identified tens of thousands of potentially eligible calls but said some options would require collective bargaining changes or legal review.
Justina Tate, interim assistant city manager, presented an analysis of a Council Consideration Request on alternate responses for low‑priority calls. She said San Antonio’s public safety answering point handles roughly 2.1 million calls a year (1.8 million dispatched) and that about 177,000 calls fall within the CCR’s scope. Of those, staff identified about 107,000 that were dispatched and estimated ~69,000 could be eligible for alternate responses under the study’s criteria.
Tate walked through categories: minor traffic accidents (about 68,000 calls annually, with roughly 31,000 identified as eligible for alternate response or 46% of those calls), lost and stolen property (over 36,000 calls annually, with approximately 11,500 currently handled by sworn officers that could be candidates for alternate response), loud music (about 21,000 calls annually) and found property. For minor traffic accidents, Tate said average caller wait time in 2025 was about 32.5 minutes and officer time on-scene averaged roughly 58 minutes; staffing calculations equated those calls with an annual need of about 17 officers.
Staff presented a menu of possible alternate responses used elsewhere: deploying retired officers, hiring contractors, expanding civilian expediters, online self-reporting, assigning code-enforcement officers for some tasks, and virtual officers for some accident reporting. Tate noted that several options highlighted in the presentation would require negotiation with the police union and changes to the collective bargaining agreement.
During council discussion members emphasized the need for a cost comparison — including piloting or issuing an RFI/RFP — and raised liability and accountability concerns if third-party contractors or retirees were used. Staff confirmed contractors or retired civilians would not themselves issue citations: a sworn officer would be needed to make a citation if required, and certain alternate-response deployments would require legal and labor-review work before implementation.
