Pueblo police chief answers critics

Pueblo Police Chief Luis Velez is defending his job Monday night.

This comes after a police union survey showed a majority of police officers has no confidence in their chief.

Velez made a presentation to the Pueblo City Council.

He said he agrees on the issues the union brought to his attention like gang violence, forced overtime and lack of manpower.

Velez said he’s been asking for money from the city for years to help fight these problems by bringing in more officers.

“I think it was pretty clear that council understands the correlation between more manpower and greater response by police officers and better service by police officers,” he said.

Council member Bob Schilling said, in regards to more money given to the police, that the police department doesn’t make those decisions, city council does. Schilling said council asked the people for more money to help public safety, but the people voted no in November.

Council member Lori Winner said she doesn’t think a ballot initiative asking for more money to fund the police department will pass with the current leadership.

Pueblo resident Janet Wilson said the Velez should be replaced and she wasn’t satisfied with the chief’s response on his job performance.

“The police union survey was discounted. By saying the police didn’t really know what they were signing or what they were doing, I don’t think that’s true, we obviously have some kind of issue going on,” she said.

The police union survey showed that more than 90 percent of officers have no confidence in the chief.