Delayed APD cadet class stays focused

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Austin police cadets are back in class after a ninth-month delay. The department delayed the class from January to September to help make up for a $30-million city budget shortfall.

But Cadet Eric Copeland isn't sweating the time he had to wait to start training to be an Austin police officer.

"It was a long wait," said Copeland. "We try to focus on the positives. It gave us more time to prepare. Look at it that way."

Copeland is one of 88 cadets in the APD Academy. The class is comprised of 83 men and five women, and they are the first class to train in more than a year.

"We're glad to have them." said Cadet Instructor Officer Robert Caudill. "We're glad to finally be able to get approved through the city budget and glad they're finally able to get here, and we're enjoying training them."

The cadet will train for eight months and cannot get on the street soon enough.

"If this class had been delayed any longer, we'd really be in a critical spot, so we're real pleased they're there," said Wayne Vincent, president of the Austin Police Association.

Vincent said the delay will create a shortage of patrol officers before these cadets graduate in April.

"Other officers, say from SWAT, from traffic enforcement are going to have to leave their jobs and fill in those spots in patrol, and we anticipate that's going to happen before this class graduates," said Vincent. "The chief has done a good job of having us do more with less, but at some point you run out of gas. So we're at the bare bones right now."

The department will lose close to 200 officers to retirement this month.

Delaying the class will save the city more than $2 million in the long-run on things like salaries, uniforms and equipment.