{"id":168728,"date":"2026-02-17T22:33:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T22:33:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/168728\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T22:33:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T22:33:11","slug":"georgetown-police-address-staffing-emergency-response-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/168728\/","title":{"rendered":"Georgetown police address staffing, emergency response times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe <a href=\"https:\/\/georgetowntexas.gov\/public_safety\/police\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Georgetown Police Department<\/a> is working to add patrol personnel over the next few years amid a steady rise in calls for service, Police Chief Cory Tchida told City Council on Feb. 10.<\/p>\n<p>The gist<\/p>\n<p>Overall crime rates have dropped in the city, despite a rise in population, Tchida said.<\/p>\n<p>The police department reported a 7.38% decrease in the <a href=\"https:\/\/georgetowntexas.gov\/public_safety\/police\/about_us\/transparency.php#collapse16580b2\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">most serious offenses<\/a>\u2014which include murder, robbery and drug violations\u2014in 2025 compared to the previous year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did see a little bit of increase on the crimes against persons but overall a reduction,\u201d Tchida said.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the drop in serious crimes, calls for service increased by 4.25%, amounting to more than 30,000 calls last year, according to city documents.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s all kinds of reasons why people continue to call us from disputes or just questions,\u201d Tchida said. \u201cWith the population growth of the city, [we] have continued to see a steady increase in calls for service.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Increased call volume and the large geographic area that GPD covers have caused slower officer response times, Tchida said. The average response time for the highest priority calls rose to 9 minutes and 15 seconds in 2025, up from about 8 minutes and 30 seconds in 2024, according to city documents.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re at 62 [square miles] and some change, so that does play a role in our response times,\u201d Tchida said.<\/p>\n<p>Something to note<\/p>\n<p>Staffing has also contributed to slower response times, Tchida said. While the department hired eight new officers, it lost 13 from retirement, termination and resignation.<\/p>\n<p>This leaves operational efficiency sitting at just under 80% with some officers out due to injuries, and other recruits still moving through the academy or field training, according to city documents.<\/p>\n<p>The department conducted long-term staffing models, which recommend adding 15-17 patrol officers over the next five years to bring priority response times down to five to six minutes.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have historically in this job sold the sense of adventure and we need to focus much more on a sense of purpose because the purpose is what is going to drive people to be willing to do the hard things,&#8221; Tchida said.<\/p>\n<p>What else?<\/p>\n<p>Contacts with unhoused individuals increased slightly, up about 2% from 2024. The 1,153 contacts are not necessarily unique encounters and include repeat contacts, Tchida said.<\/p>\n<p>GPD has enforcement options such as verbal warnings and arrests for trespassing and camping violations. The department continues to utilize &#8220;zone of support&#8221; transfers, a voluntary program that helps transport individuals to areas where they have established family or support systems, Tchida said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Georgetown Police Department is working to add patrol personnel over the next few years amid a steady&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":168729,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,68376,68375,12268,54623,2086,23922],"class_list":{"0":"post-168728","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-austin","8":"tag-austin","9":"tag-austin-headlines","10":"tag-austin-news","11":"tag-cory-tchida","12":"tag-emergency-response-times","13":"tag-georgetown","14":"tag-police-chief","15":"tag-police-department","16":"tag-staffing"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}