Long story short
Harris County Commissioners Court unanimously approved the allocation of federal American Rescue Plan Act funds to add overtime officers to HCSO’s TeleDeputy unit on June 27. The unit responds only to nonviolent calls—such as an abandoned vehicle or a crime tip—which make up about 60% of HCSO’s total calls, Precinct 4 Commissioner Lesley Briones said.
The outlook
HCSO’s response time for emergency calls is about 14 minutes; the commissioners' investment in the TeleDeputy unit is expected to bring the response time down to 10 minutes, Briones said.
“What this does is this frees up and better leverages our law enforcement officers' time to address priority one and two, the more critical urgent calls related to violence,” Briones said.
