Garland Police Chief Jeff Bryan provided updates on several topics to the mayor and City Council at the Jan. 17 meeting.
Homeless task force – The Garland Police Department formed a task force three years ago. There are now three homeless officers, a homeless unit and additional civilian support. Other city departments including Environmental Waste, Stormwater, Code Enforcement, Transportation, temporary labor and outside services are also involved.
The task force identifies camps then notifies the people that they are on private property and the property owner wants them removed. They are given seven days before the camp cleanup begins. The task force also offers services such as Metro Relief and Homeward Bound. The
chronic homeless people usually choose not to use the services. In 2005, GPD received 200 calls related to homeless issues. In 2022, that number increased to 2,367.
GPD Crime Eye Program – This program is based on the tenets of CPTED, Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design. GPD has two sky watch boxes that they move to various locations. They also have one trailer with cameras and several smaller cameras. There are currently small cameras at Central Park, Rick Oden Park and Spring Creek Forest Preserve. GPD is testing their effectiveness.
NYE fireworks – The department assigns a fireworks task force of 12-17 officers to patrol on July Fourth and new year’s eve. There is also additional staffing in dispatch on those holidays as they are the busiest for fireworks calls. The problem on July Fourth lasts all day. The problem on NYE starts at approximately 11 p.m. It’s also a busy night with high priority emergency calls. Therefore, the officers must stop answering fireworks calls at some point to take care of emergency calls.
“This is a topic I think we discuss every year. We have not solved the fireworks problem,” Bryan said
Street racing/speeding – The chief receives more complaints about racing/speeding than any other issue. In 2022 GPD officers wrote almost 15,000 speeding tickets. He explained that there are two kinds of racing. The most common is when drivers pull up beside each other spontaneously and then race. It is unplanned.
The other is planned and called an intersection takeover. This has become a problem all over the Metro area. Organized groups take over an intersection and hundreds of cars gather. This type of incident happened at Highway 78 and Buckingham Road. In addition to police officers being outnumbered, fireworks, bottle rockets and artillery shells were being shot at them.
The chief said that by monitoring social media and working with a crime analyst, they were able to find out where and when the group was coming back and GPD was there in force and waiting for them.
Flock safety system – This is a license plate camera system. It gives the department the ability to search for a vehicle involved in a crime, search for critical missing persons and more. There are 45 cameras in the city at major intersections. None are placed in neighborhoods. Bryan shared several stories that highlighted the usefulness of the system.
Gunshot detection technology – It is a Class A Misdemeanor to discharge a firearm in towns over 100,000 people. However, it must be proven to be reckless and it’s difficult to meet that requirement. In addition, there are exceptions and changes in the laws that make charging individuals more difficult. Bryan said that these things make it harder to get guns off the street.
Garland PD is currently receiving a free one year trial of coverage of three square miles of a gun detection system called the Flock Raven System. The three square miles can be split into smaller blocks to total three.