TWIN FALLS, Idaho — The Twin Falls Police Department will present their 2023 Annual Report, along with their 2025 budget request at the next city council meeting, 5 p.m. Monday, July 29th at City Hall. Video can be streamed live or viewed anytime at the Twin Falls City website.
- The 2023 annual report shows overall crime in Twin Falls dropped by more than 3%
- The department will continue to leverage technology like license plate readers to help serve the population of Twin Falls, which nearly doubles every day.
- A new Crime Map has recently been made available, with updated reports by location.
RELATED | It's city budget discussion season in Twin Falls, and the council wants your input
(Below is the transcript from the broadcast story)
“Actually, crime overall went down over 3% last year,” Captain Matthew Hicks Told Idaho News 6. “So that has continued to turn down over the last couple years and I think the community should be very proud of that.”
Hicks has been with the Twin Falls Police Department for 30 years — a captain for 19 — so he's seen the city go through a lot of changes.
Although the community has seen some tragic crimes, Hicks says social media may magnify the true statistics.
A year-to year comparison shows crime in Twin Falls dropped by 3.28% in 2023 compared to the year before.
Yet the department made 2.77% more arrests.
Crimes against people, property, and society all dropped.
But there was an increase in arrests for drugs and driving under the influence.
"Nowadays it can feel like that is the normal here,” Hicks said. “But we're happy we live in a very safe community. Crime is actually down from 2022, and we want to make sure and advertise for folks that live here: this is a very safe community.”
TFPD will present their findings to city council on Monday .. as they make their 2025 budget request.
With 120 employees, it's the city's largest department.
But the city itself sees an influx of people commuting into town for work each day... Leading the department to turn to technology to help keep up.
“We have use for body cameras, to crime scene analysis, to the license plate readers that can really supplement a police officers work and try to solve a lot more crimes that we could do by just deploying an officer to try to solve that situation,” Hicks said.
The department began using eight license plate readers last year, and they have already proven their worth, he said they will ask for 12 more.
“We're asking the city to make a substantial investment in this ... we're asking for $50,000 additional dollars to supplement the program," Hicks said. "Based on the examples we're going to provide we think it's worthwhile investment."
