IMPD draft 5-year Plan: Community trust, staffing top priorities

IMPD and Taylor Advising have been gathering feedback from the community, officers and city leaders to develop a 5-year Strategic Plan to better serve the community and its officers.

INDIANAPOLIS — For the past couple of months, IMPD and Taylor Advising have been gathering feedback from the community, officers and city leaders to develop a 5-year Strategic Plan to better serve the community and its officers.

On Thursday, IMPD released a draft of the plan. It surveyed more than 1,200 IMPD employees and more than 2,200 community members, as well as city leaders.

The report says that staffing shortages are the department’s most pressing challenge, along with officer morale and the department’s ability to reduce crime.

One of the key findings in the draft says that roughly half of the community members who responded said they believe IMPD is trustworthy.

“Trust has been completely shaken since 2020,” IMPD Chief Chris Bailey said.

Chief Bailey believes that rebuilding community confidence is a top priority as the department develops the plan.

“True public safety is a shared responsibility and requires consistent communication,” Chief Bailey said.

Those concerns are immediate for east-side residents such as Calesia Preston, who said she woke Thursday to children fighting on her street and, shortly afterward, a gunshot that left a hole in her garage.

“I woke up to gunfire and kids fighting in front of my east side home,” Preston said.

Preston told WRTV that a car pulled up, people got out, and a fight broke out before the shot was fired.
IMPD said it arrested a 17-year-old in the incident.

“For them to come with a gun, knowing that there could be someone getting killed, they don’t care, and it was over a video,” Preston said.

Now, Preston and other neighbors are urging young people to stop the violence.