AGENDA REPORT - Laserfiche WebLink

School Resource Officers (SROs) are assigned to high schools and work in collaboration with school officials to facilitate and enhance campus safety. They investigate threats on or to the school grounds, crimes on campus and act as a liaison between school officials and the police department. The officers also engage with students in non-enforcement situations; this fosters the building of lasting relationships by deconstructing barriers between youth and law enforcement in the spirit of community policing. The addition of the SROs has off-set the impact to patrol officers who would otherwise be handling the routine crime-related calls. Between 2015 and 2019, the Pleasanton Police Department responded to an average of 1,089 calls for service at Pleasanton schools annually and authored an average of 229 police reports each year at these schools. Dedicated officers for school-related calls provide a prioritized response to campuses during school hours of operation; this allows patrol officers to focus on improving their response times to other calls. The program also provides consistency to the schools by having the same officers respond and be available for follow-up with campus-related issues. SROs and DARE officers are familiar with school staff, district protocols and current campus issues; they also receive specialized training on topics related to campus security, juvenile law and family issues. When school is not in session, these officers are redeployed to special enforcement activities. They are also utilized in summer months to augment the department's efforts toward investigative follow-up, burglary suppression, additional patrols, and to backfill vacation leave. Homeless Outreach Team In 2019 the City of Pleasanton formed a multi-disciplinary Homeless Outreach Team (HOT) to identify needs and coordinate services for those who are unhoused. The team was originally formed as an additional assignment for multiple officers in the police department with representatives from Housing, Code Enforcement, Police, Human Services and several community-based organizations. The police department found that not having staff dedicated to this work made coordination difficult and that an increasing unhoused population and community priority required a more consistent response. In January 2020, the police department dedicated two full-time officers to help coordinate our response for the unhoused. The two officers assigned to the HOT team have received extensive training in crisis intervention, behavioral health and intervention strategies for the unhoused. The HOT team regularly collaborates with Alameda County Behavioral Health to provide services for those in need. The program expenses below include time invested by officers and the unit supervisor and are based on the adopted FY 2020/21 budget. Table 3 HOMELESS OUTREACH TEAM PROGRAM= E FY 2020121 Personnel Non-labor Total Budget Total FTE Homeless Outreach $531,482 $80,094 $611,576 2.4 Page 4 of 17