Monday, December 1, 2025, 2 p.m. (Austin time), Austin City Hall
Committee: Public Safety Committee
The Public Safety Committee met December 1, 2025, chaired by Council Member Qadri with Vice Chair Laine. Public communication featured Scott Johnson on reinvigoration of the distracted driving/hands-free ordinance. The committee approved minutes from November 3, 2025, and heard a presentation from Boys and Girls Club youth leaders on their gun violence prevention and mental health work. The bulk of the meeting consisted of briefings: a BerryDunn consultant and Chief Davis on the status of recommendations from the comprehensive operational review of the Austin Police Department (records management, recruiting and retention, staffing, response times, alternative response), Dr. Tamara Harold on crime trends and Place Network Investigations in partnership with Texas State University, and Emergency Management Director Jim Reddick on lessons learned from community communications during the September 10, 2025 Zora Park critical incident. The committee also adopted its 2026 meeting calendar (with a January amendment expected for a June date) and adjourned at 3:50 pm.
0:05 We'll call the public safety committee to order.
0:08 It is December 1st, 2025 at 2:03 pm uh, and this, um, we are meeting at City Hall, located at 3 0 1
0:16 west second street in Austin, texas.
0:18 We have a quorum present, um, vice chair, lane Council Member uchin and myself.
0:23 Uh, and we will begin with commi public communication.
0:25 I will turn it over to daniel.
0:27 Love to, um, to call any speakers that are signed up.
0:30 Yes, if we can have scott johnson.
0:42 Good afternoon, council members.
0:43 My name is scott johnson.
0:44 I'm here to speak on distracted driving some background information.
0:50 I'll try to get through this as quickly as I can.
0:52 2006, There was a bicycle safety task force.
0:55 I advanced two separate ordinance ideas for texting while driving and hands free while driving.
1:01 In 2009, the City Council approved, uh, ordinance against texting while driving.
1:06 Unfortunately, with that ordinance in affirmative defense is that I was calling someone.
1:12 So it's, those are not effective.
1:14 In 2012, I started working towards having the city councils, uh, board and commission system consider these urban
1:23 transportation, public safety commission and community technology that, that has a different name.
1:29 As you can read along with me, I recruited bianca benson, who's still with the city.
1:33 That was a very good decision to help go out to these boards and commissions to let them
1:39 know what's happening now.
1:41 And in 2014, the City Council approved the distracted driving ordinance.
1:46 The effective date was early 2015.
1:49 A pd was doing an excellent job of, uh, second page please, uh, was doing an excellent job
1:56 of writing citations. The, the peak was in 2017 with 10,142.
2:02 As you can see, there's a minimum of $200 fine for it.
2:05 There is a diversion program that was put together by the, uh, chief prosecutor bianca benson and her
2:11 group 2019. The, the state tried to lower texting, uh, <laugh>, hands free down to texting only.
2:20 We fought it and we won, along with support from a pd and sapd.
2:25 And other cities have used our ordinance as a model.
2:29 Looking down further, you can see the ordinance effectiveness in terms of writing citations 2015 through 2019.
2:38 Third page, please. And now, and I'm certainly not here to criticize a pdi understand the staffing situation.
2:46 I'm actually the coordinator of neighborhood watch for my neighborhood for 17 years, and we just need a
2:52 working group to reinvigorate this process.
2:54 So we raised the awareness for people that have moved here since the late 20 teens, and those
2:59 people that are already here who don't know about the ordinance.
3:02 And we need to find creative ways to enforce the ordinance.
3:05 And there May be some options beyond just a pd, having more staff for patrol.
3:11 There's some other things on there that May be of interest to you.
3:13 Obviously, the fatality issues from the last decade and early this decade, you can see those numbers.
3:19 And from a, a comprehensive report by cambridge telematics study, you can see the top 10 reasons why
3:26 people are looking at their phone while they're driving.
3:29 And some of those are surprising.
3:31 Some of them are not surprising.
3:34 There are two videos that were developed, one in the 2015 timeframe to warn people about distracted driving
3:41 and the consequences. And then there was one done more recently by the vision zero program, and those
3:46 are available. You can see the link there and I can send that to you.
3:50 Questions. Council Member dechen.
3:54 Scott, thanks for putting this together.
3:56 Can you make sure you can send this, send your data to us when you have a chance?
4:00 Uh, I'm just curious, what do you think is a, the next best step?
4:04 And the other question I have is just based on your data, it looks like, you know, by
4:08 2019, there's a star's, a sharp drop off.
4:11 That's even before I think that we, um, channeled our motors unit into a different purpose at a
4:18 pd. So what do you think is going on there?
4:20 Have we solved a problem?
4:21 Was there a sense that we needed to write less citations by then?
4:24 Well, the discretion, obviously, is there with the officers on patrol.
4:30 One of the benefits of having a hands-free ordinance is that even if they're holding the phone and
4:34 not using it, they can be cited.
4:37 We tried to get it when they were at a stop, but it was pulled out by former
4:41 Mayor leffingwell and, uh, former Council Member now the late, uh, bill spelman.
4:47 And they didn't let us know the working group folks, which is un unfortunate.
4:51 And that, and that won't happen again if we configure another working group.
4:55 We're gonna try, try our best to be sure that our intent is translated into policy.
5:01 To answer your question, um, I can't say why it dropped off.
5:04 There's certainly opportunities to write more.
5:06 Again, I'm not here to criticize the police staff.
5:09 I respect them. I work with them because I'm the coordinator for my neighborhood.
5:13 As I said, I think what what happens is that people try different tactics to not be seen.
5:20 And that would include bringing the phone down below their, the center of their body, holding it down
5:26 in their lap, and then looking at it.
5:28 And I'm, I'm sure that happened a lot.
5:30 And therefore, you, you can't see if you're in a patrol car that's not higher than the other
5:36 car that then you can't see it.
5:37 A pd did do this, which is creative, where they, for a short time use, use buses.
5:42 And that was a limited time, limited scope.
5:45 There was some concern from the community.
5:47 I don't think that's necessarily what undid it, but I do think people use creative ways.
5:54 And one of the things that I find ironic is that many vehicles, newer vehicles, you don't need
6:01 to hold the phone, but it's just a habit.
6:04 You can talk through the bluetooth.
6:05 And that's part of this working group that I'm suggesting to this committee and also to the mobility
6:11 committee, is that we have that because we need people to know that they have options and to
6:16 use those options. Or they could be cited.
6:18 There is a diversion program, as you might have seen in there, and that's helpful because we don't
6:24 want to be punitive.
6:26 If we can educate our way out of it, we would, but it's really not possible to do
6:31 that. Recently through, at the mobility committee in November, they, they've cited about a 840 or 850 folks
6:41 this year, which is a marked increase from earlier in the 20 2020s.
6:46 So that's great news.
6:49 Thank you. I look for the data.
6:51 You're welcome. Thank you, mr. Scott.
6:56 Um, colleagues, uh, the first action will be to our, our first item will be to approve the
7:00 minutes of the public safety committee meeting for November 3rd, 2025.
7:04 I'll accept a motion to approve the, the, the minutes motion made by Council Member uchin, seconded by,
7:10 um, uh, vice chair lane.
7:12 Without objection, the, uh, meetings, uh, the minutes are approved.
7:17 Item number two, and colleagues, I'm very, very, very excited about this.
7:21 The community will now take up item number two.
7:23 Uh, and that is the boys and girls club community violence intervention work presentation.
7:28 Um, I got to meet with these young leaders a a while back, and they have gone on
7:34 to, uh, lobby members of congress, namely Council Member, uh, uh, congress member, uh, former Council Member, greg
7:41 casar. Um, and now they're here to testify before us.
7:44 But they have been actively working to improve safety, not only in their neighborhoods in the, um, uh,
7:51 meadowbrook apartments, but just in Austin overall.
7:54 And, uh, I just wanted to recognize, uh, mackenzie zepeda, har atal man, hassani blankenship, kelsey taylor, and
8:04 siah martin. Um, and with that, I will turn it over to marisela casals, director of character and
8:10 development, uh, leadership development at the boys and girls, bro.
8:13 Boys and girls club of Austin.
8:34 Hello, my name is sydney trevino, and I'm with the boys and girls club.
8:37 Thank you all for having us here today.
8:39 Behind me and to the side of me, I have some very prominent club members at meadowbrook.
8:44 Next to me is kelsey taylor, and this is a tall man doe.
8:47 Uh, back in March, we were tasked with creating a social justice program, uh, aiming at mental health
8:54 support, and they chose their topic of gun violence.
9:02 So they worked for several months, uh, creating ways to implement gun violence prevention programs.
9:09 They reached out to you all over here.
9:11 We reached out to our hawker bo h board members as well, uh, and came up with a
9:16 project that ultimately led some of them to go to washington dc.
9:21 So we're very proud of them for that.
9:23 Uh, if my president, mr.
9:26 Atal, would like to speak on some of the service projects that him and the other group did,
9:34 uh, hi. Um, some of the service projects we did was a cl community cleanup.
9:40 Um, meadowbrook members participated in a cleanup on a Saturday, um, with the city of Austin, um, cleanup
9:48 group. And we cleaned up a lot of trash together, improving living spaces.
9:54 We, the second one we did was thrive fest, which was a animal thrive fest to celebrate healthy
10:01 lifestyles with a focus on mental wellness.
10:04 This fair provided community with access to resources and community partners that support, uh, and promote wellbeing in
10:13 the community.
10:18 And now kelsey will go ahead and talk about our, our main focus, which was our gun violence
10:23 program. Metal prep club focused on gun violence prevention as their community has been ly impacted by it.
10:37 Navarro club focused on access to mental health sources, resources, and copying strategies for athletes in their campus.
10:45 Teens in their campuses are often, are often involved in multiple extracurricular, um, activities, and often hold, wait,
10:54 hold a job to support their family's work life balance and stress copying strategies are needed.
11:01 Otherwise, it can lead to poor athletic and poor academic performances and mental health struggles.
11:08 Home club, home club members focused on promoting wellness and women, mental and physical health, and women vital
11:15 order to have stronger and safer communities.
11:20 So, as you can see, we have a bunch of bright young people also behind us, uh, some
11:24 of the club members from navarro.
11:26 Correct. Uh, so we definitely, again, thank you all for inviting us here.
11:32 This is a great opportunity for them, not only to get out of school early, but to see
11:36 this beautiful building, which we have not been to yet.
11:38 So thank you. Perfect.
11:41 Uh, colleagues, do we have any questions?
11:45 I just wanna thank you for coming.
11:47 Um, and I also, I more have a comment than a question.
11:53 Okay. So I think that, and I have seen that the voices of our young people can be
11:59 very powerful to elected officials like us.
12:03 And I just want to encourage you to continue coming, exercising that civic participation muscle, and telling us
12:10 what you see and hear and feel, because that's what we need to know to make things better
12:15 for the future. So, thank you very much,
12:23 <laugh>. I, I also wanted to thank y'all.
12:24 I mean, since, I believe it was about March when we first met and we got to hang
12:28 out. And, and meadowbrook, uh, and our friends from, um, life innu brought us together to be able
12:33 to talk about cvi.
12:34 And I'd explained to y'all that I, that I lost a little brother to gun violence in, in
12:37 2009. It was a very personal issue to me.
12:40 And, and I appreciate your advocacy.
12:43 Um, I was, uh, I think it was, um, it was, uh, we were talking with, uh, atal,
12:50 and I was telling him there was no way when I was his age, that I was ever
12:54 gonna be advocating for anything.
12:55 But to see the energy and, and the inspiring stories that these, that, that these young leaders had
13:01 around wanting to better their community was it, it, it landed with me.
13:05 And I wanted to make sure that y'all always know you have a place here at City Hall,
13:09 anytime you want to come back and testify and come and inform us about the work that you're
13:13 doing around this issue.
13:14 So appreciate your service.
13:16 I appreciate y'all traveling to washington dc to represent Austin, texas, and let them know what we were
13:20 working on and what you're working on.
13:22 And anytime you want to come back, you're always welcome to come back before this committee, and thank
13:25 you for being here with us today.
13:29 Thank you. Thank you.
13:31 Thank you.
13:37 Um, colleagues next, uh, the committee will not now take up item number three, um, briefing on findings,