Chief wants new cars
Police budget includes request for 90 vehicles
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LAFAYETTE — Police Chief Jim Craft on Wednesday said he will ask the City-Parish Council to approve the purchase of about 90 new vehicles in the next budget year, about $2.2 million worth.
Craft and some of his senior officers met Wednesday with members of the City-Parish Council to answer questions about his upcoming budget requests and other operational matters as part of a regular police liaison meeting.
He said that the Police Department for some time had not rotated out old cars to bring in new ones, and he wants to begin a proper rotation of vehicles.
Craft said the problem comes in getting that rotation going: It is cheaper in the long run for the department but expensive in the early stages.
The 90 cars he is requesting — 47 to replace aging marked cars, 25 to replace aging unmarked cars and the addition of 18 marked cars — represent more than a third of the approximately 250 vehicles used by the department, he said.
Craft said the changing out of cars is not just something he advocated, but is a recommendation of the fleet supervisor for the City-Parish Public Works Department.
Craft said that some of the cars on the list of vehicles that need to be replaced have been on that list for up to three years.
He said that some cars in the department’s fleet are more than a decade old, though the older vehicles are not used for high-traffic purposes such as patrol.
Craft said the department would need to add eight of the cars to its fleet because of a proposed agreement with the Lafayette Parish School Board to have police officers dedicated to the four public high schools and four public middle schools within the city limits.
Craft said some of the need for cars is driven by the fact that the department is fully staffed at its complement of about 250 officers for the first time in anyone in the department’s memory.
“I’m told it’s the first time in 25 years,” he said.
Craft said the department has five remaining vacancies, all of which will be filled once some applicants have finished training.
He said the department will actually have two more qualified applicants than it has open positions.
Craft and some of his senior officers met Wednesday with members of the City-Parish Council to answer questions about his upcoming budget requests and other operational matters as part of a regular police liaison meeting.
He said that the Police Department for some time had not rotated out old cars to bring in new ones, and he wants to begin a proper rotation of vehicles.
Craft said the problem comes in getting that rotation going: It is cheaper in the long run for the department but expensive in the early stages.
The 90 cars he is requesting — 47 to replace aging marked cars, 25 to replace aging unmarked cars and the addition of 18 marked cars — represent more than a third of the approximately 250 vehicles used by the department, he said.
Craft said the changing out of cars is not just something he advocated, but is a recommendation of the fleet supervisor for the City-Parish Public Works Department.
Craft said that some of the cars on the list of vehicles that need to be replaced have been on that list for up to three years.
He said that some cars in the department’s fleet are more than a decade old, though the older vehicles are not used for high-traffic purposes such as patrol.
Craft said the department would need to add eight of the cars to its fleet because of a proposed agreement with the Lafayette Parish School Board to have police officers dedicated to the four public high schools and four public middle schools within the city limits.
Craft said some of the need for cars is driven by the fact that the department is fully staffed at its complement of about 250 officers for the first time in anyone in the department’s memory.
“I’m told it’s the first time in 25 years,” he said.
Craft said the department has five remaining vacancies, all of which will be filled once some applicants have finished training.
He said the department will actually have two more qualified applicants than it has open positions.
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