Seated in a patrol SUV with the cool air blasting, officer Tim Evans has his eyes on the computer screen and his hands on the keyboard.
He's filling out forms and entering in the particulars of a collision between a light-green sport utility vehicle and a school bus carrying elementary school children. He clicks and taps his way through the report, detailing the vehicle damage, the weather at the time of the crash, the drivers' information and their apparent mental state, along with information on the companies that towed the vehicles away.
Evans also diagrams the crash by superimposing vehicles onto a map of the intersection, pinpointing the area of impact.
"You can see where this can get time-consuming," Evans said. Later on, he said he will have to enter in the names, genders and dates of birth of the nearly dozen children riding in the bus.
The city sees his point, too.
In an effort to help free up officers' time, Little Rock is creating a civilian traffic unit that will have the authority to conduct crash investigations and issue citations, said police spokesman Lt. Steve McClanahan.
Officials say the positions -- known as traffic safety officers -- will give officers more time to proactively police their districts, instead of being tied up working a minor traffic crash.
"We'll still have officers working accidents, but this should make a huge dent in freeing up their time," said Assistant Chief Alice Fulk last month, adding that the unit should also free up officers to answer more calls for service.
Little Rock plans to hire a dozen traffic safety officers and the city is accepting applications through Tuesday, according to McClanahan. The traffic officers, he said, will be able to respond to noninjury accidents and minor-injury accidents.
City Manager Bruce Moore said investigating vehicle crashes can be a time-consuming effort for police, with officers spending an average of 74 minutes taking care of a traffic crash.
"That's taking away from the officer proactively patrolling their district," he said.
Last week, Evans spent about 45 minutes clearing the intersection of the two-vehicle crash at North Rodney Parham and Treasure Hill roads. And by the time Evans was done putting the information he had into the incident report, it was almost an hour and a half before he started actively patrolling the streets again.
The plans for the traffic unit comes as Little Rock department deals with dozens of officer vacancies.
As of Aug. 23, there were 80 sworn officer vacancies in the department.
According to department data, 51 vacancies are in the city's three patrol divisions and another 13 vacancies are in the department's Major Crimes Division, which is responsible for investigating homicides, shootings and other violent crimes.
Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola has said that filling the police vacancies is critically important to the city.
The vacancies, he said, have hampered the department's community policing efforts. With patrol officers so busy responding to back-to-back calls, it leaves less time to connect and build relationships with community members, he said.
This is not the first time Little Rock will have traffic safety officers. Traffic officers began responding to crashes in 1996, but the unit was shut down about 7 years later, McClanahan said.
McClanahan said the creation of the traffic unit is not related to the department's vacancies. In the '90s, when the department did not have such high vacancies, officials still thought the traffic safety officers would be effective at freeing up officers' time, he said.
The new unit will be under the Special Operations Division, and employees will report to a Little Rock police sergeant, McClanahan said.
Before beginning work on the street, McClanahan said the traffic officers will receive training on how to interview witnesses and determine the area of impact, along with how to read skid marks and debris scatters.
He said the traffic unit will comprise unarmed civilians, but the traffic officers will be equipped with a police radio to call if they need officers' help. The public will also be able to differentiate Little Rock police from traffic officers, who will have different uniforms and will not have blue patrol lights.
According to the job post on the city's website, the city is looking for candidates with at least two years of experience involving "investigation, inspection, interviewing, including recording and reporting of data or related area."
"We're hopeful that having these 12 full time TSO positions will make our response time quicker," McClanahan said. "[It] will make us more efficient, more effective."
Metro on 09/04/2017