AUSTIN (Talk1370.com) -- The Austin City Council could decide whether to re-open the Austin Police Department's cadet training academy on Thursday.
The move comes as the department faces mounting vacancies that it can't fill, and council and community members have worked to "reimagine" the academy curriculum.
Austin Mayor Steve Adler said some of the curriculum elements were outdated and used videos that put too many people of color in bad images and scenes.
"As we go forward I think we ask our police officers to do too much stuff they shouldn't be the way our city deals with poverty or intersects with mental health interventions in our city," Adler said.
Council members will consider Thursday a resolution that will start the process of re-opening the academy by early June, with the following objectives:
*Address concerns about academy curriculum, training techniques, and overall learning objectives identified by Council and the community in the past;
*Incorporate recommendations made to date from both Kroll and the APD's own reviews of the academy under the 066 resolution;
*Acknowledge the work of, and incorporates input from, the Community Video Review Panel, the City‐Community Reimagining Public Safety (RPS) Task Force, and other community members, as well as from our own Equity Office and Office of Police Oversight;
*Serve as a launching point for real reforms to academy learning objectives, curriculum, and training that align with the public safety expectations of the Council and our community; and
*Address the City's need to maintain adequate staffing within APD to provide for the public's safety and welfare.
The last cadet class to graduate from the academy was in Fall 2020.
