OCA Audit Reports

Issued: February 2007

SUMMARY

This report presents the results of the Austin Police Department (APD) Recruiting and Training Audit which was approved by the Audit and Finance Committee of the Austin City Council as part of our office’s FY 2006 Service Plan.

APD has a recruiting and training program designed to produce the best and most diverse candidates to protect and serve the citizens of Austin. In 2004, APD commissioned the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF). The primary goals of the study were to examine the current training environment to determine the extent of support within the department for a culture of continual learning and to determine the extent to which the training function furthers professional policing practices beyond the cadet training environment. This report was one component of a departmental action plan designed to address racial profiling and use of force issues.

Our audit objectives were focused on whether APD has implemented high-priority recommendations from the PERF report. Specifically, we wanted to know how APD has been managing the implementation of the PERF recommendations which address: 1) the effectiveness of APD’s recruiting efforts in helping them to achieve their mission of protecting and serving a diverse community, 2) if APD’s Academy is providing the best quality training for the greatest number of cadets each year, and 3) if APD adequately addressed use of force issues according to the PERF report by improving their level of community engagement.

We found that APD is managing the implementation of all recommendations issued in the 2004 PERF report and confirmed the implementation status reported by APD for selected recommendations. We tested 28 of the 59 recommendations made in the PERF report, 18 of which were determined to be key recommendations by PERF and 10 others that we determined to be most directly related to the original reason for commissioning PERF. At the time of our review, APD had implemented 21 of the 28 tested recommendations, 6 were in progress, and 1 had not yet been implemented.

We found that while the Austin Police Department (APD) has been working to recruit more minorities and women, more effort is needed to achieve a police department that mirrors the demographics of the Austin community.

We also found that APD has implemented a course of action to improve the training curriculum and adopted procedures to continuously evaluate the training program according to the PERF recommendations.

APD has acknowledged that they need to improve the relationship with minority communities and created an action plan in 2004 to address use of force issues and the perception of bias in policing. This action plan was completed in 2006 and the results are available on the Department’s website.

Download the entire text of our APD Recruiting and Training (Size: 315 KB) in Adobe Acrobat. You will need Adobe's Acrobat Reader to view these files. Or request a hard copy of this audit report, No. AU06108, by submitting this audit report request form.

The City Of Austin is committed to compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Reasonable modifications and equal access to communications will be provided upon request. Please call (512) 974-2805 or Relay Texas #711.