Redding Police Chief Robert Paoletti outlined Redding crime statistics for 2015 at a town hall meeting Thursday night. Overall crime is down, but the chief says property crime is up. He attributes that to increased use of methamphetamine and heroin in the community, and a lack of jail space.
But he says the recidivism rate among probationers is going down, because of a Day Reporting center. It provides mental health and social services to people on probation, as well as job training and classes toward a GED.
"The recidivism rate or the re-arrest rate, which I believe is the true recidivism rate, is about 14 percent,” Paoletti said. “Really I think we're getting some traction when we get them into our rehabilitative program, it’s just a matter of having bed space to get them there. So it really is police staffing coupled with jail bed space, but also we're still struggling with this addiction, and mental health problems. So it really is putting resources across all three arenas."
The chief also talked about an updated website for crime reporting, touted the new police station, and gave an update on police body cameras which he says are very close to being implemented. He told the sparse crowd at the Sequoia Middle School the one thing he would like to work on is response times which he says can take up to fifteen minutes for non-priority calls.