Page 25 - FY 2009 Proposed Budget

Business Plan
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Table of Contents
Table of Contents
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The Arbor Day Foundation selected Arlington for its Tree City USA award (21-year honoree), by meeting four core standards of
sound urban forestry management: maintaining a tree board or department, having a community tree ordinance, spending at
least $2 per capita on urban forestry and celebrating Arbor Day.

The Police Department (APD) is responsible for public safety through a variety of citizen outreach efforts, education, and
enforcement activities. Relationships are the cornerstone of how the department interacts with community members to achieve
desired public safety outcomes.

In 2019, APD received the International Association of Chiefs of
Police Civil Rights Award, a testament to how the department
approaches policing in our community. Through this approach,
APD has also been recognized by the United States Department of
Justice for the department’s innovative training curriculum in
responding to hate and bias-based crime.

Leading the way for reform once more, APD has expanded the hate
and bias-based crime reporting policy to include hate incidents. The
new reporting policy will ensure that hate incidents are captured by
reporting processes as well as hate crimes. This is an important
shift as non-criminal hate incidents can cause significant harm to
our community. With the new policy, the department has developed a training curriculum that has been presented on the national
stage for other agencies to replicate.

APD’s engagement in the community was highlighted again in 2019 when thousands of residents organized and joined 252
rd
neighborhood parties for the annual National Night Out. Thanks to the citizen’s enthusiasm, APD was the recipient of 3 place
award in National Night Out awarded by the National Association of Town Watch.
The special relationship with our community is the result of the sacrifice of our officers. For this reason, Texas Governor Abbott
bestowed the Star of Texas Award on two APD officers who sustained severe injuries while in the line of duty.

One of the most vital components of APD’s operations is the invaluable work of hundreds of volunteers. In 2019, APD volunteers
recorded 30,543 hours. Citizens of all ages and backgrounds volunteer for the department and are engaged in many different
functions, from administration to crime prevention. The result of their efforts is thousands of dollars in savings and a safer
community.

The Arlington Police Department operates through a geographic policing model, providing proactive and creative problem-
solving strategies to address crime in designated geographic boundaries. The underlying goal is for officers to know their
residents and business owners to build healthy relationships
within the community through assignments in specified
geographic areas or beats in the city. Our Victim Services Unit has
also adopted geographic structure to meet the needs of Arlington
residents.

The department is accredited through the Commission on
Accreditation for Law Enforcement (CALEA), receiving initial
accreditation in 1989. With our law enforcement agency, training
academy, and public safety communications center all accredited
by CALEA, we proudly maintain Tri-Arc accreditation by meeting
a multitude of standards for policies, procedures, and best
practices.

2021 Adopted Budget and Business Plan 14 City of Arlington, Texas