Brandon City Council to discuss dissolving police department on Monday

Brandon, S.D. (Dakota News Now) - Brandon City Council members and the community will come together on Monday to discuss the possibility of dissolving the police department.

“At this point there is no set consensus by the council to move forward on this, what will happen is it will be discussed,” said David Kull, Brandon City Council Member.

Former council member Blaine Jones says this is not the first time this has been discussed, but those involved understand why there is reason for debate.

“From a council perspective I think they are only doing their due diligence from a fiscal standpoint to see if it makes any sense,” said Jones.

Some council members voiced their opposition to dissolving the police department.

“This discussion sends the wrong message to our dedicated police officers and the Brandon community,” said Vickie David, Brandon City Council Member.

Still, discussions like these are not uncommon for cities to have.

“That we have these discussions and there’s councils and commissions that have discussions like this all the time, it’s fair to bring it up, to hit some of the talking points and then decide how to proceed,” said Kull.

Opponents say Brandon is already an extremely safe city to live in and that doesn’t happen by accident.

In 2019 the city was voted the safest city to live in South Dakota by backgroundchecks.org.

“Nothing but good to say about the Minnehaha County Sheriff’s Office, they are also an incredible group of people, that have nothing but a top-notch agency, however there are big differences between a municipal department and a sheriff’s department,” said Jones.

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