The Pella Police Department saw a continued decline in arrests, traffic accidents, and tickets issued in their end-of-year report for 2017.

Pella Police Chief Robert Bokinsky tells KNIA/KRLS News arrests are continuing to drop since 2013, which he feels is a direct result of better investigations by their department and the work of the Marion County Attorney’s Office leading to more effective charges, convictions, and prison time for habitual offenders.

Bokinsky says it’s less clear why vehicle collisions went down last year from 258 in 2016 to 188, and additional studying of traffic patterns and data from 2017 will be done this year to see if that’s a sustainable trend.

Additionally, he says officers have made an effort to issue more warnings and less tickets and citations since Bokinsky started in 2012. Hear more about the Year in Review for the Pella Police Department on today’s Let’s Talk Pella, and find details from this year’s numbers at KNIAKRLS.com.

2017 Information (with Departure from Five-Year Average in Brackets):
Calls for Service: 8780 (+5.04%)
Phone Calls: 15,380 (-1.54%)
911 Calls: 2174 (+9.05%)
Parking Tickets: 1115 (-9.9%)
Citations: 713 (-8.96%)
Warnings: 2302 (+10%)
Arrests: 164 (-29.31%)
Charges: 267 (-22.47%)
Traffic Collisions: 188 (-22.47%)
Ambulance Calls: 1992
Fire Calls: 114