Police Chief Lisa Davis has been at the helm of Austin’s Police Department for six months. In that time, she has helped finalize a police contract and change the flow of traffic on Sixth street during weekends.
But there is more work to be done within the department, she said. Davis spoke with KUT News about the department's relationship with the Travis County District Attorney José Garza, vacancies within the police department and the reopening of Sixth Street to traffic on weekends.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Interview highlights
KUT's Luz Moreno-Lozano: APD and the District's Attorney’s office appear to have a strained relationship. Since you've been in office, what have you done to try and address those issues?
APD Police Chief Lisa Davis: I think the relationship has certainly improved. We meet monthly and we talk very often. He knows my opinion about things, I know his, and we definitely collaborate and work together well.
Some of the frustration among APD officers is repeat offenders. Have you talked about how the city can ensure those repeat offenders aren’t coming back?
Davis: I think when you talk about recidivism, and you talk about the danger to the community, like what exactly is the crime that they are committing. I know that this DA is very excited to work together on a focused deterrence and identifying those offenders. Identifying who are our top offenders, and then looking at it from a holistic approach. If this is someone we can do some harm reduction, and they can get into a program, that’s fine. But when we’re dealing with the more violent crimes, and the more dangerous people, to truly look at what is the best way to serve the community, I look forward to that conversation. Because I think he feels the same way.
With more officers available, what are your priorities around addressing some the challenges the city might be facing?
Davis: When you're looking at the vacancies, I believe we just graduated 29 officers so it was 340, so let's do the math on that. But with this contract, we’ve seen — our recruitment efforts have increased by 166%. So we're seeing the numbers come in to take these initial tests. The goal is to have three academy classes through a year. And if we can keep the numbers between 60 to 80, we should be able, by the end of 2027, truly see some remarkable change here with these numbers and maybe be down 40 officers at that point.
The attrition rate has stopped — it has slowed with this contract, so fewer people are leaving. ... But with that, when you're talking about such a reduced workforce, you have to be smart about the way you do business. So currently, we have detectives who do backfill. When you look at who's on patrol, we need to put more bodies in patrol, and certainly, these classes that are coming out, that’s where they’ll be going. But how do we do more with that? How do we do more with what we have?
What I’ve noticed about this department is it's very centralized, and so can we decentralize some of these units and get them back in the sectors? They’ll still do investigative work but just in those particular sectors. And I think that's a way to start at looking at how we get people back, and truly giving these commanders the autonomy to do the work that they need to do within their sectors. I can’t say to a commander, 'Look, I’m holding you responsible for crime reductions in your area, for response times in your area', and then not give them the resources that they need to do that. So that’s what I'm looking for is how do we do that and do it smart and thoughtful.
The perception among Austinites is traffic enforcement is not happening. As you get more officers in, will Austinites see more traffic enforcement? What would be your first steps to do that?
Davis: Absolutely. If there is one way that officers can truly save lives it is through traffic enforcement. And that is a reality. So I’m a big proponent of that. But what I do want to do is we have equipment here — we have motorcycles, you know this unit was disbanded. I would love to put a few motorcycles in each sector. For, again, these commanders to be able to address issues such as traffic, such as complaints that they're having and give them the tools. ... So have them come out, split these motorcycles up to go into these sectors. Again, being thoughtful about it — who needs more, what does it all look like, what does the data show us?
Certainly, when we start getting more officers here, to put a unit back together that is just for DUI or traffic enforcement, that is a huge deal. Commander Mike Chancellor has brought in some DUI enforcement downtown, and I think in the last few days they've made 11 DUI arrests. And so it's important, and it truly makes a difference on the roads.
You put a memo about how reopening Sixth Street has been positive for crime, etc. Can you tell us more about what the city is seeing with those changes?
Davis: I had a meeting today with some of the business owners on Sixth Street, and one of the things we're going to be working forward with is a task force. It's going to be people who own these businesses on Sixth Street, with myself and people within the police department and probably some other city officials on how we do move forward. This is happening. The reality is we have seen a drop in crime, a drop in uses of force and a drop in officer injury by doing this.
Now it's about what is the next phase? We cannot leave this fencing up. One, it's an eye sore and two, it is costing a lot of money for the police department to pay for that. And so how do we move forward by keeping a barrier between (the road and the sidewalk) because that's exactly what we want to do. We want to keep it open, but keep people safe.
Do you think that is something that will play out in the budget? Or how do you think APD would implement that?
Davis: I think the permanent changes will probably be a few years, so we definitely need something in this middle area that we are in — whether it's planters, whether it's some different fencing that's more secure and that looks better. I think that's kind of the conversation, what will be the next step. Ideally, ballards would be fantastic in that area. That makes sense, but again those are a few years off.
