Brown has concerns about police department
BY PHIL REYNOLDS SOUTH JETTY REPORTER

Directing traffic STAFF PHOTO BY DAN PARKER At Cotter Street and Cutoff Road, Sgt. Sandra Flores of the Port Aransas Police Department directs traffic lined up for the ferries on Sunday, 16. Mayor Claude Brown is asking for a review of how well the police department is performing its duties.

Mayor Claude Brown will ask fellow city council members to take a look at how well the police department is performing its duties when the council meets tonight, Thursday, June 19, at 5 p.m.

Brown said he's concerned that patrol officers aren't patrolling the city as well as they should be. He said he spent some time on the beach on a recent weekend and saw no police cars during the time he was there. Brown added that he'd been asked if police no longer patrol the beach.

The department recently hired a new patrol officer, bringing it up to seven patrol officers out of a total authorized force of 10.

Numbers from the police department indicate that in April of this year, 81 citations were written for incidents that could be classed as "patrol-related" - that is, something an officer would see on patrol, not one he would be dispatched on as a result of a call to the police department. They include traffic violations and vehicle faults such as broken brake lights as well as such things as public intoxication.

For May, officers wrote 230 cita- tions, police department figures show. That's an increase of 149, or 183 percent, over April of this year.

In April of 2007, officers wrote 139 citations of the same type, compared with 188 citations in May of that year.

City Manager Michael Kovacs has said he has received no complaints from residents about police behavior or performance.