The Austin Chronicle

By Austin Sanders

12:56PM, Wed. Sep. 11, 2024

Jonathan Kringen, a former leader at the Austin Police Department tasked with studying crime data, will not be getting his old job back following a daylong hearing at the Municipal Civil Service Commission on Sept. 9.

Kringen was hired in 2020 as APD’s chief data officer, and he became the public face of the partnership between APD and the Department of Public Safety last spring. During the controversial partnership, he presented data at several City Council meetings intended to defend DPS’ presence.

His firing wasn’t related to that work – instead, he was fired in April following an arrest on domestic violence charges in late 2023. The case remains pending. He appealed the termination, which would have forced the city to rehire him at APD or transfer him to a different department in a similar role, but the commission denied his appeal.

At MCSC hearings, civilian employees fired by the city can argue that they were wrongfully terminated and should be reinstated. Typically the meetings are public, but participants can request that hearings be conducted in private. Kringen and his attorney Brad Heilman made such a request Monday, citing the sensitive nature of some evidence that would be discussed. The city’s attorneys arguing against the appeal did not object.

So we don’t know what exactly went down at the hearing or what motivated commissioners to deny Kringen’s appeal. Sources familiar with the MCSC appeal process say the hearings resemble a civil trial – a plaintiff (the fired employee) attempts to convince a jury (the commissioners) that the defendant (the employer, the city in this case) fired them without following proper procedure as laid out in Municipal Civil Service rules. Each side is granted two hours to make their case and can introduce evidence and call witnesses to testify like in a trial.

It is unclear who all testified at the hearing, but during the public portion of the meeting several members of APD’s executive staff were sworn in as witnesses – including Interim Chief Robin Henderson, Chief of Staff Jeff Greenwalt, Assistant Chief Lee Rogers, and Victim Services Director Kachina Clark.