Becker Police Chief Brent Baloun gave his annual report for 2014 at last month’s city council meeting.
Citations issued in 2014 were up 857 from the previous year. Baloun’s officers issued 1,914 warnings for traffic violations, up 723 from 2013. The department issued 254 speeding tickets (compared to just 200 in 2013), 27 expired license plate tabs (compared to just seen last year), 46 driving after revocation (32 in 2013) and 39 driving after suspension (19 in 2013).
Stop sign violations were down (10 in 2014, 26 in 2013) as well as parking violations (45 in 2014, 54 in 2013) and seatbelt violations (55 in 2014, 69 in 2013).
Other calls for service include alarms (105), vehicle lockouts (132), medicals (157), vehicle accidents (82), animal complaints (123), agency assist (280 and domestics (37).
Baloun said his department had been seeing serious crime decrease over the last five years until last year where it spiked up by five crimes — most of that due to an increase in larceny (theft). For less serious crimes, Baloun noted vandalism and destruction of property was down significantly in 2014 while family/children issues increased from nine in 2013 to 27 in 2014.
The Becker Police Dept. saw their number of calls increase from 4,382 in 2013 to 5,276 in 2014. The busiest time of the day for BPD is between 7 p.m. and 2 a.m, where police received 2,315 calls for service. The call volume during the hours of 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. is lower (1,938) as well as 3 a.m. to 10 a.m. (1,023).
Baloun says his department fields the majority of calls on the weekend with Mondays being the slowest day of the week.
In the report, Baloun says his department patrols a 9.1 mile area protecting the 4,600 citizens of Becker. The chief has five fulltime officers under his charge as well as three part timers. He also oversees the volunteer police squad/reserve unit consisting of eight dedicated participants.
The Becker Volunteer Police Reserve Officer Program is made up of men and women who volunteer their time without pay to assist the BPD with various needs and projects throughout the year. Without the help of the reserve officers, the BPD would likely incur additional overtime and be less responsive to the needs of the community.
Baloun said the reserve unit volunteered a total of 680 hours in 2014 for such activities as ride alongs, working Freedom Days, 5K races, Night To Unite, Shop-With-a-Cop and attending meetings. They also put in 74 hours for training, 28 hours of office assistance, 14 hours at the Chamber Business Expo, 12.5 hours for the State High School Golf Tournament at Pebble Creek, 7.5 hours at the Touch-A-Truck event and 4.5 hours at the Harvest Fest event.
The 680 volunteer hours equals to a $27,500 savings to the city and the BPD.
The BPD throughout 2014 received monies from various sources with some of the collected revenues used to assist in budgeting and day-to-day operations. Baloun said he budgeted around $51,000 of revenue and received over $85,000.
Baloun also said his department saw a 2.76% (or $21,293) savings in expenditures.
Officer Jon Kurtz received a Medal Of Valor Award in September for his brave and heroic efforts one day last year.
Kurtz responded to a call April 8 at 12:36 p.m. and discovered a male — who had initially left the scene — was now at the scene but was in an agitated state. At the scene were the man’s children, wife and father.
Kurtz said the male stated he had nothing to live for and grabbed a filet knife and lunged at Kurtz. Kurtz placed himself between the man and one child and the father while displaying his handgun, ordering the man to stop.
The man continued his pursuit of the officer and Kurtz grabbed his weaponed hand, holstered his handgun and deployed his taser on the male subject. The man dropped the knife and was taken into custody.
Later, the male subject said, “I wanted the officer to shoot me and I can’t believe that he didn’t.”
Kurtz’ actions potentially saved numerous lives, including his own, the child and the grandfather as well as the male subject.
