Open Letter to New Police Chief

Dear New Chief:

I have a few suggestions for the Laredo Police Department that would improve response times to calls for service and make life easier for local citizens.

1.  Sub-Stations:  Reduce the number of sub-stations to north (off Mines Road) and south (centralized in south of 359 hwy).   Man these stations for 16 hours per day with civilian employees.

2.  Instruct the citizens of Laredo that the police will no longer dispatch a police officer on the following types of calls for service:

a.  Non-injury accidents on private property.
b.  Theft/burglary of a home/business of less than ???? dollars.  (you figure out the number, as we know detectives do not actively investigate minor thefts.  They do not have the time)

Start with these types of calls and move forward in looking at other calls for service that could be eliminated where there in no police actions taken.

3.  Have citizens report minor accidents and thefts directly to sub-stations or by phone to the sub-station (number location can be provided by dispatcher), or online.  Most of these calls for service are never investigated, and are only processed for the citizens insurance company.

By doing 1,2, and 3, patrol officers time will be freed up to respond to real calls that require a police action, disturbances, large thefts, major accidents, and others.

Then, you need to instruct your patrol officers on how to really do pro-active patrol versus just handling calls for service as they come across their computer screen.  Maybe, they could start with issuing citations for people who run red lights in front of them.  I see it all the time.

There are many things that these officers can be doing other than handling minor issues that will never see a detective or further follow up occur.

NOTE TO CITY COUNCIL:  Don't start whining about your district not having a sub-station.  Most of these so called sub-stations are nothing more than parking lots.  This city is not that big (land mass) and does not require 7 substations.  Kansas City, Missouri, much larger than Laredo only has 6 sub-stations with 4 times the population, and 10 times the land mass.