Coffee City discusses rebuilding police department after department deactivation last month

KLTV
By Kristine Guevara
Published: Oct. 9, 2023 at 8:08 PM GMT-7

COFFEE CITY, Texas (KLTV) - Coffee City is moving forward to rebuild its police department after the City Council deactivated the entire department last month.

In September, an investigation was conducted into allegations that former Coffee City police chief Johnjay Portillo allowed multiple officers to live in Houston while working remotely for the department. The Henderson County Sheriff’s Office is covering the area at this time.

At Monday evening’s city council meeting, council members discussed their plans to address the city’s finances before the selection and hiring process, as well as wanting to form a community committee to get opinion on the direction of the future police department.

”We need to form a police department that follows the state guidelines which mandate that you don’t fund your police department with traffic citations. So, that being said, I need the people in our community to understand how limited our funds are now,” said Coffee City Mayor Jeff Blackstone. “We don’t have property tax. We operate solely off of sales tax. So, with Tyler now selling alcohol, that really cuts into the revenue that’s here for Coffee City.”

City Council said they will have a better idea of what the city can afford for a police department and a timeline by next month’s city council meeting.