MWC Citizens Voiced Opinions About Police Services

Citizens voiced their concerns about Midwest City police services at a town hall meeting Tuesday night. It was part of an effort by an outside group to evaluate the department.

A company called Matrix held the meeting after weeks of studying the department, looking into what does or doesn't need to change.

Citizens expressed concerns about staffing and improving officers' responses to nuisance calls.

Others asked the officers to work on their interactions with the deaf community and discussed the importance of race relations.

Among the meeting's mentions were positive experiences with officers and compliments about response times.

It was all the kind of feedback the city manager said they're looking for.

Aside from this town hall, officers have gone door-to-door and held community events over the last several weeks.

"Certainly with what's happened across the country in the last couple of years, our involvement with the community is just that much more important because if something does go wrong, you want to have those relationships with people so that you can solve the problems," said City Manager Guy Henson.

The consulting group was hired by the city for about $65,000. Another group was hired to study the fire department.

The full results of the police study including the takeaways from Tuesday night's meeting are expected in November.