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Council hears request for police staffing and equipment that could cost about $2.3 million
Summary
City Manager Sylvia reported the police department requested 11 positions (8 sworn, 3 civilian), five vehicles and radio/records upgrades; she estimated the department request approaches $2.3 million and described mitigation options and funding trade-offs for the council to consider.
City Manager Sylvia told council the Bastrop Police Department submitted a multi-part budget request that includes 11 positions (eight sworn officers and three civilian positions), vehicle replacements and radio/records upgrades.
"Police department has requested 11 positions, 3 civilian and 8 sworn officers, and that's about 1,000,000 and 0.5," Sylvia said while reviewing the submitted package, adding vehicle and equipment costs that push the department request into the roughly $2.3 million range.
Sylvia outlined mitigation options to the council, including revisiting transfers from enterprise funds, delaying one-time purchases, or altering employee benefit-cost sharing. She also noted that adopting a lower tax-rate option would require offsetting reductions, trimming programs, or eliminating positions if no other funding source is found.
Councilmembers asked for metrics and KPIs to justify additional officers rather than relying on head-count alone; Mayor Pro Tem Kirkland urged modeling of workload and saturation metrics before committing to new hires. No staffing decisions were made at the workshop; staff were asked to bring more analysis tying staffing requests to operational metrics and public-safety outcomes.
