Bethel Police Dept. calls stats exceed New York stats per responder

Bethel Lights photo by Greg Lincoln taken on Nov. 14th, 2017.

by Greg Lincoln

Bethel Police Officers are responding to calls per person that are higher than Anchorage, Dallas, Los Angeles, and New York, said Bethel City Manager Pete Williams in his report to the Bethel City Council. The statistics are from the Uniform Crime Reporting Index from: https://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-Bethel-Alaska, according to the report. Williams and the Bethel Police Chief reviewed the staffing report and discussed the stats.

“We know that by adding officers to the force we can reduce the number of calls that each officer responds to,” wrote Manager Williams. “The big question is how do we reduce the violence?”

The Bethel police force is anticipating three officers to start this month, one current officer will be joining the Alaska State Troopers. Two officers will also be attending the Alaska Department of Public Safety police academy in Sitka from February to May 2021.

For the month of December there were 1217 calls for service including 150 calls for intoxicated pedestrians, 7 DUIs, 38 domestic violence reports, 45 animal calls, 1 animal bite report, 4 sexual assault reports, and 3 death investigations.

Thank you to our Bethel Police force for your service.