Let me start by stating that I respect the job that the El Paso Police Department does, both in terms of quality and relative cost. Our current chief seems to be a no nonsense type who unfortunately has to deal with the city heirarchy. He seems to have been able to keep a low profile and not bring his difficulties with city management out into the public eye.
How many policemen do we need?
I am not an expert on law enforcement issues. I might be wrong in what I am about to say. If so, I trust that someone will set me straight.
Many times when I hear about the need to increase the number of officers, the justification given is in terms of number of officers per population size. The list below shows those numbers for a few cities in the area:
| Citizens per officer | |
| Albuquerque | 517 |
| Austin | 496 |
| Dallas | 356 |
| El Paso | 579 |
| Fort Worth | 496 |
| Phoenix | 491 |
| San Antonio | 606 |
| San Diego | 705 |
The average for these cities comes to 512 citizens per officer, putting El Paso in a position where each officer must deal with more people.
Number of crimes
El Paso is recognized as the safest large city in the United States. Our crime rate is low compared with other cities. The FBI publishes reports that show the total number of crimes (violent and crimes against property) by city. Looking at the numbers based on the number of crimes that each policeman has to deal with:
| Crimes | Officers | Crimes per Officer | |
| Albuquerque | 33,869 | 1,055 | 32.10 |
| Austin | 46,878 | 1,605 | 29.21 |
| Dallas | 62,680 | 3,666 | 17.10 |
| El Paso | 19,270 | 1,078 | 17.88 |
| Fort Worth | 36,986 | 1,505 | 24.58 |
| Phoenix | 70,368 | 3,146 | 22.37 |
| San Antonio | 89,611 | 2,303 | 38.91 |
| San Diego | 37,229 | 1,863 | 19.98 |
The average number of crimes each officer has to deal with each year in these cities is 23. El Paso’s police officers deal with fewer crimes than the average. By the way, I wanted to include Tucson but the FBI says that Tucson does not tally property crimes the way that the other cities do.
Remember that these are not jaywalking or traffic offenses. Violent crimes and crimes against property take more time than simple events.
The size of the police department is a major factor in our city budget. We should at least have a thorough discussion about how big our police department should be.
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
I am glad i do not live in Austin, San Antonio or Chicago!
LikeLike
Should not you also count the total number of law enforcement? Border Patrol? CBP? etc.
LikeLike
Also Texas has legal concealed carry…do you know the rate for our edge of Texas ? An armed society is a Polite Society
LikeLike