T-R PHOTOS BY ROBERT MAHARRY Marshalltown Police Chief Mike Tupper, left, and Acting Fire Chief Christopher Cross, right, delivered their annual reports to the city council during Monday night’s regular meeting.

Marshalltown Police Chief Mike Tupper and Acting Fire Chief Christopher Cross presented their annual reports to the city council during Monday night’s meeting, sharing a general overview of how 2023 went for both departments and the biggest challenges they are facing looking toward the future.

MPD: Staffing, wellness and community outreach are major focuses

Tupper, who is in his 13th year leading the MPD, stepped to the podium first and noted that National Police Week is currently being observed from May 12-18 with an open house at the new police/fire facility held concurrently on Monday evening.

It was another busy year for the MPD with 30,679 total calls for service (about 590 a week) and 2,956 criminal cases/reports filed, an increase from 27,711 and 2,747 in 2022. As Tupper often says, the department has work for 50 officers even though they’re only budgeted for 42.

“Our department is very busy. There’s a lot of things going on, and we spend a lot of time and effort not only addressing criminal issues, which you expect of us, but we spend a lot of time and effort in community outreach trying to address quality of life issues, trying to build positive relationships in the community,” the chief said. “And we are blessed to have a lot of community support. It has nothing to do with me. It has everything to do with the people working in the police department. (The staff) has done a really good job of building support, building legitimacy, being transparent, and those are all high priorities for us.”

Police officers, both in Marshalltown and around the country, are still asked to do too much, Tupper added. As he prepares to retire from the MPD in the near future, Tupper predicted “a lot of changes” on the horizon in law enforcement, including more civilians working in police departments and addressing issues that shouldn’t necessarily be assigned to cops.

Recruitment of quality officers is another familiar challenge, especially as Marshalltown competes against the Cedar Rapids and Des Moines metropolitan areas and higher amounts of money are used to bring them in, which Tupper said he didn’t think was sustainable over the long term.

“We’re gonna have to be innovative. Marshalltown is innovative. We’re built on that, right? And we’re gonna have to be innovative here in the police department,” he said.

He then dove into what he considered the biggest challenges the department is facing: recruiting and hiring officers (including a parking enforcement officer), continuing to build and maintain trust with the community and the budget. As an annual reminder, Tupper noted that the MPD has no community outreach budget, but the program remains successful “on shoestrings.”

From there, he added another priority: wellness.

“My profession has done a horrible job, in the 32 years that I’ve worked in it, of taking care of each other and taking care of the people that work in it, so wellness is a priority especially for the younger generation coming into the workforce. More work-life balance is important, and I think we need to do a better job of taking care of each other,” Tupper said. “So this year we’ve implemented a pilot project where we’re trying to address mental and emotional wellness. It’s important for your police officers, so we’re working to address that and provide more resources. We’re also having some important discussions about fatigue.”

Fatigue is a major issue, he said, across the police, fire, 911 and EMS fields, and Tupper said they are working on finding solutions. One area where he feels the MPD has done “a fabulous job” is keeping up with technology — the chief shouted out MPD Employee of the Year Wyatt Shelangoski and his comments in a recent T-R article about the award — and he felt that continuing to stay on the cutting edge will be instrumental in recruiting and retaining officers going forward.

At the June 24 meeting, Tupper plans to come before the council to discuss the need to replace body and dashboard cameras, which are no longer optional equipment, and he also touted the success of the Flock public safety cameras thus far.

“(It’s a) great program. It’s already helping us solve crime. It’s improving the efficiency of the police department and the effectiveness of our police department,” he said.

The MPD has finally received its Department of Transportation (DOT) permits, and the remaining cameras should be placed and operational along Highway 14 soon. Drug crime remains a key priority for the department as Tupper indicated that it drives all of the other types of criminal activity the MPD deals with like burglary and theft on a regular basis.

“A lot of the people that get involved with those crimes, they’re chasing $20 so they can go buy some drugs,” he said.

Beginning on June 3, Tupper plans to dedicate another investigator solely to work on drug crime without adding staff, and he asked the councilors and those in attendance to advocate for drug task forces when they speak with state and federal legislators as funding has dropped off in recent years. Finally, the chief spoke of the need to continue the Marshalltown Police and Community Team (MPACT) program, which embeds two social workers with the MPD to handle non-emergent, non-criminal calls, as that funding is also nearing its end.

“You’re going to have to find a way to keep that program going. We are exploring federal grants, but we have to keep this program going,” Tupper said.

The chief credited Councilor Gary Thompson for his initial support of MPACT and advocating for giving the MPD $150,000 in initial funding when they only planned to ask for $25,000. As he wrapped up his remarks, Tupper told the council that the number one complaint he hears on a day-to-day basis is speeding, both in person and on social media, which he considers a good thing because it’s better than dealing with a huge surge in violent crime.

Nevertheless, it’s still something he wants the MPD to address, and he felt that the Automated Traffic Enforcement (ATE) cameras have been helpful in that regard along with officers patrolling the streets as much as they can. He concluded by thanking the public and the council for their support as well as the staff who make up the MPD.

With no questions or comments from the council, Mayor/Acting City Administrator Joel Greer thanked Tupper for all he has done and added that the outreach has been “phenomenal.” The full 2023 report is available at https://www.marshalltown-ia.gov/DocumentCenter/View/9945/2023-Police-Department-Annual-Report-?bidId=.

MFD: Leadership change, decrease in fire loss highlight another busy year

Acting Fire Chief Christopher Cross, who has held that title since late March, presented the final report from his now-retired predecessor, David Rierson, who served the MFD for just shy of 10 years.

In 2023, the MFD responded to a total of 3,476 calls for service between fire and EMS, and the average fire response time was 7 minutes and 40 seconds for fire and six minutes for EMS. The total amount of fire loss was halved in 2023 as there were 17 less structure fires — in 2023, the loss was about $200,000 compared to around $400,000 in 2022.

Overlapping incidents are still a concern for the MFD as 858 runs were either doubled or tripled up in 2023.

“We take longer to get to places when we have multiple calls in the queue. If we have two or three runs happening at the same time, it takes us longer to positively dispose of the call, meaning go and provide service to whoever needs (it), whatever they need,” Cross said.

Similar to the MPD, Cross and the leaders of the MFD would love to add more staff, but they’ve backed away from a plan to apply for a federal grant because it would eventually fall on the city to cover the entire salary of the new employees once the grant funding expires.

“I’d like to revisit that with you should I have the opportunity to do it as the formal fire chief in the future,” he said.

According to Cross, the inspections division has increased its output and productivity and enjoys a good relationship with its vendor. He also discussed proposed legislation on EMS as an essential service and said he would be supportive of making it a requirement in Iowa code.

“In solving that big picture problem that will probably take conversations across agency lines, across municipalities, and it will probably take a lot of collaboration to be able to fix because I don’t think that any one entity can fix a problem by themselves because the problem is big and the problem will cost money to fix to be able to staff (it),” Cross said. “And I think the only option out of being dropped in the middle of that forest, the path is collaboration. I’d be happy to bring that to you when some ideas present themselves. I’m excited to present those to you.”

The MFD is also utilizing a wellness initiative aimed at addressing cumulative trauma whether it’s emotional, psychological or physical. The local union is working to develop peer assistance groups, and cardiac screenings are another key focus as 43 percent of line of duty deaths in the firefighting world are attributed to heart attacks, strokes and overexertion.

“We’re trying to put together a wellness program that we can budget for that is dealing with the most at-risk employees, those that are over 40 with at least 10 years on the job and then 50 years and plus because we have a good mix of those employees throughout the ranks of the fire department,” Cross said.

The department is currently in a state of transition due to Rierson’s retirement, but Cross is confident about the direction and the people who make up the staff of the MFD to carry out their duties to the best of their abilities and make his job as a leader easier.

There were no questions from the mayor or councilors, and a full copy of the report can be viewed online at https://www.marshalltown-ia.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/79.