The San Angelo City Council on Tuesday approved a new Meet and Confer agreement with the San Angelo Police Officers Coalition (SAPOC) and held the first public hearing for a related amendment to the city’s 2025–26 budget addressing police pay and staffing.
The agreement, which will take effect Oct. 1, 2025, and run through Sept. 30, 2026, sets terms and conditions of employment for sworn police officers. Negotiations between the city and the coalition concluded in recent weeks, resulting in several compensation and policy updates.
According to Human Resources Director Veronica Sanchez, the agreement includes a 5% pay increase for police officers and changes to how certain leave time is counted toward overtime, including vacation, emergency leave, WOW days, and United Way leave. Sanchez also discussed that the contract creates a sick leave payout structure intended to improve retention and prevent unnecessary sick leave usage, and allows for the appointment of two deputy chiefs through the conversion of two existing lieutenant positions.
Additional provisions include new options for disciplinary procedures, confidentiality in internal affairs investigations, and a streamlined process for resolving disputes and appeals.
To implement those changes, the council also held the first reading of an ordinance to amend the city budget for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, 2025.
During discussion, Mayor Tom Thompson raised questions about how previous year’s pay adjustments have impacted recruitment and retention within the department.
“As a city, we have struggled with retaining and keeping police officers and pay and compensation,” Mayor Thompson said. “Since ’23, we’ve done some compensation changes — we’ve got about 34% in increases in public safety, 32% in fire, 34% here — is that getting us close to where we need to be?”
Police Chief Travis Griffith answered, saying progress has been made, but competition remains strong.
“I think we’re doing great inside the confines of what we’re given as a city,” Griffith said. “Based on our income, if you will, from our tax base and where we are at, I think we’re doing well, but when we compare that to Abilene, Wichita Falls, Temple… I mean no, we’re not near to that — our biggest competitor we’ll never be close to, which is DPS. We lose candidates or current police officers to them.”
Griffith said improving department morale and continuing to expand recruitment efforts are key priorities.
“Anything that we can push on, which would be morale inside the department, making sure we’re pushing towards force multipliers to provide a way to get the numbers up that we need,” he said. “We’re seeing recruiting doing an outstanding job, we’re seeing the academy trying to double up and get more people into the academy. Everything that we can push on that’s in the confines of the arena that we’ve been given, we’re doing a great job at.”
Griffith said cooperative contract negotiations like the one approved Tuesday help support the department’s long-term staffing goals.
“The more we see a wonderful, cooperative approach on contracts like this, the better we’re going to be and more people will want to work for a place that gets along and is appropriate and for the betterment of the employee outside of just compensation,” he said.
The council voted unanimously in favor of the agreement.
