Memphis police response times are quicker for active calls, but how do they compare to 2020?

This story has been updated to reflect the correct number of Blauer-certified retailers in Memphis.

The Memphis Police Department's average response time for active crime calls has dropped about 10.6% in 2023 compared to last year, MPD brass said Tuesday morning.

The drop reflects a 51-second drop so far this year, but is still about 32 seconds slower than average response times in 2020, according to Memphis Police Department data presented to the Memphis City Council.

"The solution to call response time is [having] more officers on the street, to have more officers available to respond to calls," Assistance Chief Don Crowe said during the presentation.

A hiring push at the department has been underway for years, reaching for the goal of employing at least 2,500 officers. Currently, the department has 1,947 active officers, according to headcount data from Memphis' data hub.

Similar to years past, the bulk of calls the department gets each day tend to accumulate in the early evening. In past years, the bulk of calls came in around 6 p.m., but the trend for 2023 indicates calls being received about an hour earlier.

Although the data points towards improvements in response time, the data presented Tuesday exclusively applied to "priority 0" calls. These calls tend to be active, and the most urgent, including someone actively being carjacked, shootings and active break-ins.

The data does not include MPD's priority 1 and 2 calls, which MPD Chief Cerelyn "C.J." Davis said made up the majority of the call volume. She said the department is working to assess that data and establish benchmarks for those calls.

Discussions over Memphis Police Department uniform vendors

Discussions about how MPD agreed to work with a vendor for department uniforms also took place, with Councilman Frank Colvett asking why local vendors were not chosen.

MPD agreed to work with Galls, a public safety uniform company based in Kentucky, to order uniforms. The Memphis Fire Department agreed to get its uniforms from the same company.

Davis said the company promised quick delivery, online ordering and a variety of gear that would provide officers with comfortable and "professional" uniforms. Previous MPD policy called for a specific brand of uniform, Blauer, but Davis said the policy was "highly irregular."

"It is highly irregular to put any particular vendor or any uniform type in a police policy," Davis told the Memphis City Council. "That was changed because we had so many complaints about uniforms from our women, from smaller-sized officers. Now they can get fitted with any uniform that actually fits them

The department, to provide those uniforms, began giving its officers $400 of credit for Galls to purchase their uniforms on July 1.

Brenda Basar, the owner of locally-owned Alpha One Apparel, spoke at the city council meeting Tuesday as well. Her business opened a few months ago, and said her company is one of two Blauer-certified retailers in Memphis. Basar said Alpha One Apparel was one of the businesses that requested to be the department's vendor, and she said she believes the process pushed away local businesses.

"We have approximately $1.8 million in uniform contracts that have gone out in the last eight months," Basar said. "90% of those went to the one out-of-state vendor, Galls, both Memphis police and fire. There's a lack of local opportunity, a lack of local minority opportunity."

Steve Basar also spoke in defense of Alpha One Apparel, saying that the business is at risk if MPD continues to use another vendor.

"If we're not able to serve MPD, which represents 80% to 90% of the market, you're going to put us out of business," Steve Basar said. "I'm not saying that lightly. We will not survive if we do not have Memphis police officers at our store, continuing to shop like they have for the last six months."

Lucas Finton is a criminal justice reporter with The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at Lucas.Finton@commercialappeal.com and followed on Twitter @LucasFinton.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: How are Memphis police response times in 2023?