Community groups call for an end to APD, DPS partnership

Multiple community representatives and activists called for an end to the partnership between the Austin Police Department and the Texas Department of Public Safety during public comment at City Council’s regular meeting May 4. The concerns echo questions raised by Council members at Tuesday’s work session.

“Subjecting these communities to constant surveillance and fear of humiliating traffic stops and searches, arrests, fines, fees, license suspension, and even violence and deportation that can result from them is an injustice,” said Susana Almanza, founding member and director of PODER.

Almanza questioned the “alleged” reduction in violent crime touted by APD and DPS as the result of the arrangement. She called the partnership “undemocratic” and criticized the lack of a formal agreement in place.

“Stop racial profiling. Please end this partnership immediately,” she said.

Fellow East Austin activist Daniel Llanes thanked the Council members, in particular Council Member Natasha Harper-Madison, for expressing community concerns about the patrols.

“Having lived in Austin for over 40 years, I’ve never, never seen anywhere in Austin the kind of presence DPS (is currently maintaining),” Llanes said. “It’s like a fascist state, y’all. You’ve got to stop. It’s no good.”

Chris Harris, policy director of the Austin Justice Coalition, also called for the end of the agreement. “That this partnership is being executed without any mutually agreed upon or verifiable guarantees, guardrails, goals, metrics or way for it to end is foolish,” he said.

Harris said he has heard questions from Council regarding whether the patrols can be directed in ways that can ease the impacts on marginalized communities. He pointed to DPS Director Steve McCraw’s Tuesday comments that his officers have discretion in whether to issue citations, but do not have discretion over which Texas laws to enforce.

“Unfortunately, if we have the patrol units – this is what they do,” Harris said. “So we don’t really see a way for this to work in our community and not violate the values of this community. Bringing in predominantly poor people, people of color, on vehicle violations; bringing people in on very low-level offenses; fighting the war on drugs in a way we don’t see fit to fight it here. So our position is we should end this partnership, we should end these patrols.”

At Tuesday’s work session, Mayor Kirk Watson said any “unintended or unwanted” consequences should be addressed, but that the partnership is paying off in “faster response times for assistance and in reduction in violent crime.”

APD chief data officer Jonathan Kringen said the department has seen a reduction in emergency response times from about 11 minutes before the partnership to about 7.5 minutes now in areas of DPS deployment.

In terms of violent crime, Kringen said the department found an approximately 26 percent reduction in violent crime compared to the same week last year, and an approximately 35 percent reduction in violent crime compared to the week before the partnership began. He said violent crime reported in week four was approximately 15 percent lower compared to the year to date average.

Asked about racial profiling, McCraw cited the demographics of Travis County, which are 78 percent white, 33 percent Latino and 9 percent Black. According to data he produced, of the total stops so far this year in Travis County, nearly 50 percent of the drivers are Latino, 29 percent are white and nearly 16 percent are Black.

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