City of Morgan Hill Public Safety Master Plan

are some spikes that break the 60 percent threshold, the large majority of the days and times feature manageable workloads.

In its totality, however, the patrol shift schedule in the MHPD should be sound. Officers should be given the opportunity to enjoy extended periods of time on a particular shift. Given the availability of resources, the other elements of the current schedule, including time off each cycle, are sound and appear to meet the needs of the department. Alternatives can be developed to accommodate training needs (discussed in the training section of this report) without dismantling the current shift plan. Recommendations:  Empanel a calls for service (CFS) committee to evaluate service demands and attempt to reduce and/or eliminate the number of nonemergency responses.  Examine the reasons for, and seek to minimize, the excessive time spent by patrol officers on out-of-service tasks.  Add one sergeant position to Field Operations for coordinating administrative and planning efforts. Spatial Representation of CFS Demand The figures presented previously (Figures 3-1 through 3-8) provide a thorough examination of the service demands placed on the Morgan Hill Police Department during different times of the day and week. In addition to these “temporal” demands, it is also possible to illustrate the “spatial” demands on the MHPD. An examination of the spatial demands permits the exploration of where incidents are occurring. As can be seen in Figures 3-9 and 3-10, there are several distinct incident “hot spots” in Morgan Hill. It is clear that retail, commercial, and traffic conditions along a central corridor command a great deal of attention from the MHPD. There are numerous discernable hot spots in this area, as well as sizeable concentrations of CFS in other retail and commercial locations throughout the city. This comes as no surprise, as these areas are vibrant and well-traveled part of the community and presumably would demand a large share of attention from the police department. Each one of the actual “hot spots” in the community should be the focus of a specific and targeted strategy that aims to eliminate, or drastically reduce, the conditions contributing to police service demands present at those locations. Undoubtedly, these locations receive the lion’s share of attention from patrol officers in the department, and consideration should be given to formulating a deliberate plan to deal with these locations in a proactive fashion. For example, the MHPD could work with private security at shopping centers to minimize theft, which would minimize the demand placed on patrol resources. Similarly, the department could work with the commercial establishments in the city to regulate activities more aggressively. Also, consideration should be given to deploying personnel, or some other specified resource, to deal specifically with CFS  Maintain the current patrol shift schedule and continue to utilize 12-hour tours for patrol.

Police Operations and Data Analysis Report, Morgan Hill, California

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