Make a Difference

21st Century Policing in Houston

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Everyone agrees we need to be tough on crime. But saying it and doing something about it are two different things. In today’s challenging economy we need leaders who have the knowledge and experience to make the tough decisions and the smart choices that will keep our children, our families, and our communities safe.

My goal as Mayor is to make sure we have the best trained, best equipped and best paid police officers in the state, and a department that engages the community as a respected partner in keeping all Houstonians safe. To that end:

I will protect the police department budget in this economic downturn.

We learned a hard lesson when the city closed down the police academy to save money during the last major economic downturn in the 1980s. It took years to recover from that mistake. As Mayor, I will do everything in my power to maintain and, if possible, increase the police budget.

Protecting our law enforcement budget without raising taxes is a difficult but necessary balancing act. My 12 years as a City Councilmember and as Controller have prepared me for the challenge. I have a track record of fiscal responsibility, using tough audits to cut millions of dollars in fraud and waste – money that is now funding priorities like police, firefighters, after-school programs and economic development.

With so much at stake, now is not the time for “on-the-job” training.

I will add more police officers to the force.

How many police officers are enough? My bottom line is that Houston needs what it takes to keep us safe.

HPD is constantly aware of the need to increase staffing. Determining just how many officers are needed is challenging. First and foremost, consideration must be given toward identifying the needs of the community, which will help the Department determine what type of work should take precedence and how that work should be performed.

Today, our law enforcement leaders are united in saying we do not have enough officers on the force. I am absolutely committed to maintaining a full schedule of police cadet classes. I will work with the department to aggressively recruit and fill more classes – making sure we maintain our high standards.

I will also work with my police chief to ensure that as many officers are out on the street as possible – that means restoring overtime dollars. It also means putting civilians in technical or clerical jobs and making sure our officers are in direct law enforcement positions.

I will appoint a police chief who is an innovative thinker and has the respect of the officers and a deep knowledge of the community.

Because public safety is essential to everything we do, we will have a police chief who understands our neighborhoods and communities and has his or her fingers on the pulse of the city.

The chief must be a good manager and have the respect of the officers. And he or she must be an innovative thinker – willing and able to rethink how we have traditionally done policing, how we can more effectively allocate resources among divisions and how we can use cutting edge technology when possible and available.

I believe the most qualified candidates for chief – those who will keep Houstonians the safest – exist within the ranks of HPD.

I will direct my police chief to initiate a top-to-bottom management review process.

Accountability starts at the top and runs the gamut from overseeing spending to preventing misconduct to taking steps to become more efficient through inspections, audits, and performance reviews.

The city of Houston spends 59 cents out of every dollar in its General Fund on public safety – $675 million on the Police Department alone. Every taxpayer, officer and civilian employee deserves to know that our department is following the law and is efficiently managing its resources.

That’s why I will work with the chief to implement a top-to-bottom management review process, including the creation of an internal management review team (with the help of outside experts as necessary) to evaluate the department on a regular basis to improve its processes. The chief will decide whether this team works inside the Inspections Division or is independent.

I will direct my police chief to develop and implement a plan to better coordinate and cooperate with other local law enforcement agencies.

Dozens of law enforcement agencies have jurisdiction over parts of Houston. Their officers are certified peace officers who can enforce the law. All of our budgets are under stress. It is imperative that we improve coordination among these agencies.

If you’re being robbed, you don’t care whether it is HPD, a sheriff’s deputy or a constable who comes to your aid – as long as they have a badge and a gun and they can keep you safe.

In order to do this, agencies must be able to talk directly to each other. The city has invested in a radio system that will allow many law enforcement agencies to communicate with each other. But the obstacles to improving coordination among law enforcement agencies are less about a lack of technology and more about a lack of leadership and priorities. That’s why I will direct my chief to come up with a plan to work cooperatively with other agencies, and I will personally reach out to other jurisdictions to make it happen.

I will step up our efforts to fight gangs in our schools and in our neighborhoods.

One of the best arguments for improved coordination among law enforcement agencies is the need to do more to fight gangs. Gangs don’t stop at the schoolyard gate, yet our various police agencies too often see that as a boundary.

HPD has been working to prevent gang activities in schools through the Gang Resistance Education and Training (GREAT) Program. Officers educate students against delinquency, youth violence, and gang membership, focusing on providing life skills to students to help them avoid using delinquent behavior and violence to solve problems. And the longer officers are present within schools, the more apt they are to become role models.

As Mayor, I will continue to make this program a priority but it will take increased coordination with our fellow law enforcement agencies. Effective gang prevention and investigation is a manpower issue that must be balanced against handling calls for service, maintaining response times, traffic enforcement, mobility, investigating non-gang crimes, and maintaining visibility in hopes of preventing crime.

Technology can play an important part of the solution. The more we can search, compare and analyze information that might lead to the identification of gang members committing crimes – and also identify patterns and trends of gang activities – the better we can do. And if our database can be fed and accessed by other law enforcement agencies in the region, our effectiveness is even greater.

Prevention, of course, is the ultimate key. Those who want to separate themselves from gang affiliations must have viable alternatives and continuous support – outside the scope of law enforcement – that include our educational institutions, non-profit organizations (including faith-based non-profits) and social service agencies.

Because a viable solution to the gang problem depends on so many different governmental and non-governmental agencies working together, the Mayor of Houston is in a unique position to offer leadership. As Mayor, I will make it a priority to bring these groups together to make sustained headway on this problem.

I will focus the department on bringing neighborhood-oriented policing into the 21st Century to prevent crime before it happens.

The hallmarks of neighborhood-oriented policing are community engagement and creative problem solving. In addition to their traditional role of arresting suspects after the commission of a crime, police officers work closely with neighborhood civic associations, business associations, neighborhood representatives and others to identify and address crime issues with a focus on preventing crimes before they happen.

Houston has made great progress in achieving these goals. But now we have the opportunity – and the duty – to use 21st Century tools to expand the power of neighborhood-oriented policing to make keep Houstonians safe.

Crime Prevention: Getting the Most Out of New Technologies

Houston is on its way to implementing our own version of the much-vaunted CompStat program employed in other major cities. We recently launched our Real Time Crime Center that instantly correlates real-time crime data to identify trends and patterns throughout the city on a daily basis.

But real-time crime data will make us safer only if we use it effectively.

As CompStat’s success in other cities has shown, that will require a management philosophy that allows officers in the community instant access to crime data, empowers them to make strategic decisions that help prevent crime and holds them accountable for improving safety.

As Mayor, I will work with the chief to put this missing management piece in place – a plan that leverages cutting edge technology and is tailored to meet the challenges of 21st Century policing in Houston.

Crime Prevention: Focusing on Locations Where Chronic Criminal Problems Exist

We can prevent crime by identifying and addressing conditions at specific locations and working directly with the property owners to reduce opportunities for criminal activities.

We have a successful model for addressing this at problem apartment complexes. Once a problem complex has been identified, the police work with the property owner to create and implement a plan to remediate the problem. If the property owner fails to remediate conditions that are attracting criminals, the city can pursue stronger enforcement options. By focusing concentrated resources on the worst offenders, crime rates around these complexes have dropped significantly. Last year the city adapted this model to convenience stores and we are already seeing positive results.

Similarly, our Neighborhood Protection Division personnel and Differential Response Team officers must continue to be a priority. Their mission is to stop crime at its roots by attempting to alleviate conditions that lead to crime.

Crime Prevention: Doing Our Part as Citizens

Crime prevention starts with us – as Houstonians, we cannot simply outsource this to our police officers. But our city government must do a better job at providing guidance and support to its citizens.
It’s time to re-emphasize once-successful programs that have received less attention over the years. We need to invest in educating the public about the benefits of the Citizen Patrol program, Neighborhood Watch, the HPD Volunteer Initiatives Program and even the graffiti tip line (now part of 311) – all good examples of how everyday Houstonians can play an important role in reducing crime.

I will support the construction of a joint city-county booking facility and the ultimate consolidation of the city and county jails.

One of the best ways to make our public safety dollars go farther is to eliminate duplication of services. And one glaring example of duplication is the way suspects are processed and held in the city and county jails.

HPD officers book their suspects into the city jail – yet HPD is bound by state law and court order to release all suspects after a 24-hour period. They are either released on bond or transferred to the county jail, where they go through the booking process all over again. Additionally, our city jails are antiquated, unsanitary and in need of substantial repair.

The key to solving this problem in the near term is a joint city-county processing center where suspects can be booked only once. As Mayor, I will work with county officials to move the ball forward on this plan.

A longer-term goal is to contract with the county to provide jail services – in essence consolidating the city and county jails. A current obstacle to this plan is the need for a new county jail to replace the current jail that is critically overcrowded. Voters recently rejected a bond measure that would have funded a new county jail.

As Mayor, I will work with the county and, at the appropriate time, go out into our communities and help the county make the case for a new jail. And I will commit to raising the level of professional training available to our city jail employees so they can be hired as employees of the consolidated city/county jail.

I will continue to work for the creation of an independent regional crime lab.

An independent crime lab that produces scientific, unbiased results is urgently needed to repair one of the cornerstones of our criminal justice system and restore public confidence. Our police deserve a first-class weapon in the fight against crime. The public deserves a first-class crime lab in the fight for equal justice.

I served on the 2007 stakeholders committee that oversaw the clean-up of the well-publicized problems at our crime lab. And I continue to believe that separation, entirely, from the Police Department is the best way to achieve the layer of independence the crime lab needs to function effectively and efficiently.

As Mayor, I will make the HPD crime lab an independent department in my first budget. And I will convene a new stakeholders committee to discuss creating an independent regional crime lab to serve the city, county and surrounding communities – an idea that has already drawn support from city and county leaders.

I will work to keep cultural awareness training and education a priority so we can protect all Houstonians while treating them with dignity and respect.

The face of Houston is changing every day – and to keep all Houstonians safe, our police officers must understand and be a part of every community in Houston. As a former instructor at the Police Academy on cultural awareness issues, I know the department has been committed to continuous training and education in this area for close to 20 years – and as Mayor, I will work to continue and expand these programs.

One program that merits expansion is the use of Crisis Intervention Response Team (“CIRT”) Units. These are 2-person units staffed with an HPD officer and a highly trained member of the mental health community. Their special skills and knowledge are used when they respond to calls for service involving difficult mental health issues. In addition to the mental health recognition training received by all officers, the use of CIRT Units has been a big success within the department.

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