A letter to Houstonians from Chief Hurtt
The city of Houston remains a safe place to live, despite reduced [police] staffing and an increasing population. While any increase in crime, especially violent crime, is unacceptable, I believe Houstonians should know that this city remains a safe city, that the Houston Police Department is committed to reduce crime in the city and that the initiatives under way within the department will yield results over time.
Recent reports have depicted Houston in a crisis, and that simply is not the case. Houston overall is a safe city.
Official department crime statistics reflect that rates of increase in violent crimes are in the single digits or slightly down from the previous year. During the first two months of 2006, for example, violent crime, a category consisting of homicides, rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults is up 7.1 percent compared to the same time period in 2005, while total crime is up only 1.8 percent.
In addition, despite much publicity regarding crime increases throughout 2005, especially in the last few months of that year, the city's violent crimes rose only 2.4 percent compared with 2004, and the total crime rate actually decreased 1.8 percent during the same time period. Holding crime to this level despite an increase in the population of as many as 150,000 persons, and at a time when the department continued to experience reductions in its staffing is a testament to the dedication and hard work of every member of the police department.
I believe that focusing resources in areas where we see increases in violent crime will yield results. In fact, our Neighborhood Enforcement Task Force Team (NETT) initiative, through which we placed the equivalent of 150 additional full-time officers in patrol, already resulted in 2,444 arrests, 1,851 criminal charges filed, 934 criminal investigations cleared, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in property recovered since the beginning of the year. The arrests alone represent an increase in felony appre-hension by 10.5 percent and an increase in misdemeanor apprehension by 11.6 percent over what is considered normal arrests activity for the month of January. In an effort to further bolster the number of officers in patrol, we recently completed the transfer of 100 police officers from jail assignments to patrol assignments.
As I have stated before, initiatives such as NETT are short-term solutions. Therefore, with the support of our mayor and council, I have proposed an aggressive recruitment campaign to bring the Houston Police Department staffing up to nationally accepted staffing levels from our current 2.2 officers per 1,000 to 2.8 per 1,000.
Lastly, I want to emphasize that we need the cooperation of every resident of Houston to achieve our goal in making Houston a better place to live. I encourage all residents to take an interest in activities occurring in their neighborhoods and to participate in department initiatives such as the Blue Star program or the Positive Interaction Program. After all, reductions in crime benefit all of us who live and work here.
HAROLD HURTT chief of police, Houston
He forgot to mention his Fear Reduction Initiative.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/09/06 07:13 AM | Print |
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