McKinney City Council is proposing an overall 1.5 cent property tax rate decrease in fiscal year 2018-19, despite an almost 10 percent budget increase for public safety. The addition to the public safety budget will fund additional firefighters and police officers necessary to keep up with the city’s growing population. Compared to nearby cities, McKinney has fewer public safety officials per resident, but City Manager Paul Grimes said McKinney’s crime rate is significantly lower, meaning that the city’s current ratio of citizens to public safety officials is sufficient. “We don’t have the luxury of adding [public safety personnel] like other cities might have, because we don’t have the same tax revenue ability,” Grimes said. “[Other cities] have big commercial bases, so we have to be lean to provide our services. … Our city’s crime rate is the lowest in the state for a city over 100,000 people. If the crime rate is low, then it begs the question, you don’t need that many officers, because you are doing a good job maintaining or keeping the crime rate very low.” The proposed general fund budget outlined at an Aug. 10 budget workshop totaled $149.1 million, including $68.7 million for police and fire services. The budget and tax rate are expected to be approved at a Sept. 17 meeting. “We have an increase in property values; we have an increase in sales tax—a lot of it is population-driven,” McKinney Chief Financial Officer Mark Holloway said. “... So we’ve been able to increase the general fund budget and at the same time cut the tax rate.” With the 9.9 percent increase to the proposed public safety budget, city staff is requesting 34 additional public safety personnel, 20 of which will work for the fire department and 14 for the police department.

Police department need

The McKinney Police Department is requesting four communications specialists; a supervisor position for the forensics investigations unit; four patrol officers; two neighborhood police officers; and three school resource officers, or SROs. “We don’t determine staffing based on population ratio per se, but we do benchmark it,” Grimes said. “We try to maintain at least 1.25 police officers per 1,000 residents. If you do the math, and we grow by 10,000 residents a year, that’s 12.5 police officers you have to be adding every year, and we’re adding 10. We are doing everything we can to be at that 1.25.” McKinney Police Chief Greg Conley said while additional staff is needed to address crime, police officers are needed for general community issues as well. “People want us in their neighborhoods, and they want the services we provide and when you have new neighborhoods in line in the city—we need to be ready,” Conley said.

Fire department growth

The McKinney Fire Department has requested funding for one new fire-truck, an ambulance and 20 additional positions, including a battalion chief, a permit technician and 18 firefighters for the soon-to-open station No. 10. Station No. 10, which will be located in the Trinity Falls development, is expected to open in May 2020, but Fire Chief Daniel Kistner said the department is requesting money for the positions now because it takes about one year to hire and train the firefighters. As north McKinney continues to develop, the need for public safety officials increases in order to maintain a timely response to emergencies. The department’s goal is to be on the scene in 4 minutes or less for high-risk calls and 6-8 minutes for low-risk calls, Kistner said. The department is currently responding to all calls in 4-5 minutes.

Growth drives other needs

The city’s continuing population increase is also driving the need for more roadways. During the budget work session Grimes said that the council will have to consider a future bond election to fund community improvement projects after this upcoming budget. Grimes said the city’s road funds from the 2015 bond will be exhausted after next year. “If the council wishes to continue to build the infrastructure to sustain this quality of growth and leverage more commercial growth, we will need to consider an upcoming bond election to provide the funds to continue building the community without overwhelming residential taxes to try to cash-fund projects,” Grimes said.