Greeley Police Chief Adam Turk has been with the department for more than two decades, watching the population grow as the city expands.
The police department divides the city into four different sectors, to ensure there is an adequate number of officers for each area’s typical number of calls for service. But as Greeley continues to grow, Turk said the department is reevaluating those sectors.
Unlike the fire department, police don’t have a national standard for call times. But that doesn’t mean police officers aren’t responding quickly to high-priority calls, Turk said.
On average, in 2025, Greeley police took six minutes to respond to Priority 1 calls, where there is active violence, according to the department’s transparency dashboard. Response times for Priority 2 calls, for calls about disturbances or violence without a weapon, averaged eight minutes in 2025.
Having served with the fire department since 1999, Greeley Fire Department Chief Brian Kuznik has also witnessed Greeley’s population boom. When he started, the department was averaging about 5,000 calls annually. Today, that number is about 17,000.
The fire department currently has seven fire stations that are placed throughout the city to ensure the department can respond to calls quickly.
Turk said the total response time numbers for police start from the moment the caller dials 911 to when an officer arrives on scene. That means the time it takes for an officer to arrive on scene is about two to three minutes less from those total response times for high-priority calls.
“So you have some delays, obviously, between the processing and management of the call versus when (police) actually receive it,” Turk said.
The Real-Time Information Center has tools to help decrease total response times by distinguishing between high- and low-priority calls. The center is preparing to launch a Prepared 911 software, which lets the workers listen to live 911 calls, and start using drones, cameras and license plate readers to assess the situation.
However, that technology is reliant on infrastructure and funding. As the city builds out west, Turk said Real-Time Information Center cameras rely on fiber, cables and electricity.
Fire officials plan to eventually build a station out west with easy access to U.S. 34 , and police will also consider a possible substation out west. Turk said a substation would help increase the department’s footprint and provide more offices and storage in addition to the current station on 10th Street , which Turk said they’ll soon outgrow.
Fortunately, the city’s fire and police services aren’t alone in serving residents when an emergency arises.
Windsor-Severance Fire Rescue Chief Chris Angermuller said many agencies in the area, including the Greeley and Windsor- Severance fire departments, are part of an automatic aid agreement, meaning that the closest unit will respond to the emergency.
“If somebody’s having an emergency, they don’t care what the fire truck says on it, as long as somebody shows up to help them,” Angermuller said.
As all the local fire chiefs work together to serve the area, it also allows for them to come together and strategize the best place to put a new fire station. To avoid having two stations cover the same area and accidentally leave an area underserved, Angermuller said the agreement lets stations be placed to achieve an ideal four-minute travel travel response time and keep people safe.
Angermuller and Kuznik said fire departments gauge their reliability through call response times, rather than having a certain ratio of fire personnel to residents.
“While there’s not necessarily a national standard for how many houses one fire station should be able to protect, it’s more about response times and meeting national standards,” Kuznik said.
Greeley police also have a mutual aid agreement with nearby police departments, such as Windsor, Kersey , Johnstown and the University of Northern Colorado. Turk said this allows for the closest responder to arrive at a situation, deescalate and stabilize, and Greeley police can clean up the situation.
While police and firefighters are handling their increasing workload incredibly well, Greeley Councilman Tommy Butler said more public safety staff are needed.
“As the city grows you need more officers, you need more firefighters,” Butler said.
Butler said the need for a new fire station and possibly a police substation is imminent.
The Weld County Regional Communications Center currently takes 350,000 annual calls, which is expected to grow 3-5% every year, according to Tina Powell, the center’s director.
A public safety tax increase has failed twice before in Greeley and did not get on last year’s ballot due to lack of public support. The city currently has a 0.16% public safety tax that funds the police and fire department directly. The ballot proposals offered to increase the tax to 0.41% in 2024 and to 0.5% in 2025.
Turk said it is imperative that police look at new funding options to continue to grow responsibly. And growing the police department is not just adding more officers, it also requires more records management, evidence management and dispatch workers.
Fire Station 4, 2191 1st Ave. , was built in the 1970s, and Kuznik said the station doesn’t fit the needs of a modern fire station. The department is working on how to get the funding to update the building.
“We could certainly use more firefighters and additional resources into the city to manage the growing call load that we’re seeing here today already,” Kuznik said.
Even in the worse-case scenario, where there are many financial constraints that don’t allow police to properly plan ahead for population growth, Turk said police will continue to serve the city as best as they can.
“We have a duty to respond, and if it’s taking us too long, that’s not public safety. That’s not fair,” Turk said.
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