“There are a lot of great men and women that make up the sheriff's office,” Lindemann said before starting his presentation. “There's a lot of work going on there, and I want to highlight some of the good things that are happening.”
At a glance
The Williamson County Sheriff’s Office has about 570 employees, a significant change from when Lindemann worked alongside 50 employees in the 1980s, he said. Law enforcement officers serve about 1,134 square miles, with roughly 917 square miles consisting of unincorporated areas in Williamson County, or areas located outside a city’s boundaries.
“When you call 911 and you're not in the incorporated city limits, chances are the sheriff's office will be the first to respond and show up there,” Lindemann said.
Deputy constables, state troopers and other law enforcement officers can also respond to emergency calls if they’re closer to a situation. In 2023, about 246,360 people lived in unincorporated areas. That’s about 35.34% of the county’s estimated population in 2023, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
By the numbers
The sheriff’s office responded to 42,349 calls for service in four months, including animal control, livestock and disturbance calls, according to data shared by the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office. In April alone, officers responded to 11,421 calls.
From January to April, sheriff's office, or SO, deputies made 661 total arrests.
What residents should know
Lindemann warned citizens about scam calls, explaining how scammers will use spoofed phone numbers to impersonate law enforcement and establish false credibility. Scammers will intimidate and persuade people to charge a money card, sometimes with thousands of dollars, by convincing them they forgot to pay a toll or show up for jury duty, Lindemann said.
Once scam victims read the number off the back of the money card, the money is gone. He urged residents, especially seniors, to not answer scam calls.
“No law enforcement—Georgetown, [the Department of Public Safety], the Highway Patrol, the sheriff's office—no one's going to call and demand money from you over the phone,” Lindemann said.
The specifics
The Williamson County Corrections Bureau oversees the county jail and consists of 326 employees, including deputies and corrections officers, according to the presentation. The county jail has about 1,100 beds and serves inmates three meals a day. With an average daily jail population of 626 inmates, that amounts to 1,878 meals per day.
“That's a lot of trays to be washed. And when the dishwasher breaks, we spend $4,000 a week on styrofoam trays,” Lindemann said.
Doctors are at the jail almost every day of the week to check the health of the inmates, some of whom are extremely ill, Lindemann said.
“If someone passes away in the custody of the sheriff, that's going to be about an instant million dollar check that the county is writing out, even when we're doing our very best,” Lindemann said.
The Corrections Bureau Special Services Division checks on jail inmates about 560,000 times per month, Lindemann said. Officers strive to check inmates every 30 minutes, he said.
“We have a lot of cells; we have a lot of corrections officers; we have a lot of inmates,” Lindemann said. “It's imperative that we go around and do those checks.”
Managing the impact
The Organized Crime Unit is within the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office and works to take drugs and weapons off the street by targeting drug trafficking organizations, human trafficking rings, gang-related crimes and more, according to the presentation. So far this year, the unit has responded to one drug overdose.
“That's one too many," Lindemann said.
The Crisis Intervention Team, or CIT, is composed of eight deputies who respond to about 100 calls per month, according to the presentation. CIT works closely with Bluebonnet Trails Community Services and other mental health providers to help provide people with resources, Lindemann said.
“It's not against the law to have a mental illness. It's not against the law to be homeless,” Lindemann said. “We don't always like people coming up to us, making us uncomfortable, but oftentimes, when services aren't provided, it gets cast in the lap of law enforcement.”
Lindemann said he’s working alongside Georgetown Police Chief Cory Tchida and other chiefs to come up with strategies to address mental illnesses and homelessness.
Other Williamson County law enforcement bureaus include:
- Admin Services
- Animal Control
- Criminal Investigation
- Crisis Intervention Team
- False Alarm Reduction
- Financial Crimes
- Internal Affairs
- K9
- Livestock
- Narcotics
- Patrol
- Traffic
- Warrants
Quote of note
In a February Q&A with Community Impact, Lindemann said one reason public safety Williamson County is important to him is because his grandchildren are being raised here.
“I've had some wonderful opportunities in the law enforcement field over the last 40 years, but what I'm most proud of is my family,” Lindemann said at the luncheon.
