Kyle City Council members approved 6-0 an audit report on the Kyle Police Department during their Oct. 17 meeting.
The audit was part of the Meet and Greet Confer agreement between Kyle and the Kyle Police Employees Association and was commissioned earlier last year.
“When the city and association sit down two years from now, they’re going to be able to sit down and take look at this and have some milestones that hopefully we will hit as a community and be helpful in that situation.” said Mayor Todd Webster
According to James Earp, assistant city manager, Kyle City Council authorized the $45,000 contract in 2016 with the company, Matrix Consulting Group.
The report was based on information taken from one on one staff interviews, online surveys of all KPD personnel and the review of agency records.
Earp stated that many aspects of the report were positive, highlighting strengths within the department, stating that violent crime within a five year period had gone down despite the city’s population growth.
According to Earp, this could be attributed to policing in Kyle, along with active community watch measures though he said that property crimes have risen in the area.
Changes recommended for the department include staff increases, power shifts to help ease the transition between officers leaving their day shift and officers arriving for night shift during peak call hours and hiring a second lieutenant.
Now that the city council has approved the audit report, the Operations Review Committee will reconvene to review the report and decide which recommendations to implement.
