Colorado Springs residents weigh in on police and fire cuts

Closing a substation and further reducing staff through attrition are cards on the table for the Colorado Springs Police Department’s 2011 budget, police officials said Tuesday night.

About a dozen people came to the Deerfield Hills Community Center to hear presentations by police and the Fire Department in the first of four community meetings to present service model plans and get direction from residents.

Deputy fire chiefs Dan Raider and Rich Brown declined to outline potential cuts to 2011 budget for the Fire Department, which was relatively unscathed in the mass budget cuts for 2010.

“We have a whole litany of potential cuts we’ve been putting together for the last six months,” Brown said. “I’m not at liberty to discuss those tonight.”

Police numbers were based solely on the hypothetical that budget reductions would continue to come from attrition, as was largely the case for the 2010 budget, which is $4 million less than 2009, covered by eliminating the helicopter unit and not filling 50 vacancies.

With attrition, the number of officers is estimated at 620 for this year. If attrition continues, that number could drop to 614 in 2011 and 584 in 2012, said Deputy Chief Ron Gibson.

The department is also looking at closing most services, such as cold case reporting, at each patrol division after regular business hours, but staying open for emergencies.

Such hypotheticals have been considered citywide, but the city is only in the earliest stages of planning.

Current police priorities rank emergencies highest, followed by violent crime, child abuse and other crimes against persons, followed by property crimes.

Property-crime detectives have been cut by more than 50 percent since 2008.