An event-goer asks why the police department doesn’t have more of a presence in high crime areas.

Residents in the West End community grilled New Iberia’s mayor, police chief and the Iberia Parish sheriff Monday evening during a town hall meeting to address violence and police protection in New Iberia.

The town hall was organized by Councilman Marlon Lewis, who said he had been receiving many calls from constituents about violence and crime in his district.

“After I got about five or six calls, I said it might be time for a town hall and got with Councilwoman (Deidre Ledbetter) and Councilwoman Deedy Johnson-Reid,” Lewis said.

The panel consisted of New Iberia Mayor Freddie DeCourt, New Iberia Police Chief Todd D’Albor and Iberia Parish Sheriff Tommy Romero.

After a few brief words from each member of the panel, the event quickly moved into a question and answer session from the 100 or so members of the audience and the three public servants.

Questions about the diversity of the police department, the number of patrol cars that drive through crime-ridden areas and even the competence of some police investigations were all brought up during the event.

“Freddie you said you would work with the people, Todd you said you would listen,” one person in the audience siad. “We need more black officers on this side.”

DeCourt responded by saying that the department has done its best to hire with as much diversity as possible, and that the department’s work in solving crime has been very effective in its two years of operation.

“We have worked hard to get officers that are diverse in our department,” DeCourt said. “We haven’t had issues that many departments have had in terms of community issues, I can’t say we haven’t had any but we’ve dealt with them when they’ve come up.”

Another local resident who works near the St. Edward Subdivision said that the crime in the area has gotten too much to bear for people in the area.

“We cannot make New Iberia a better place when there is all this crime on the street,” she said. “They just had two juveniles get murdered, that’s unheard of and I saw it. Police told me they shot each other and I know they didn’t and I have footage.”

D’Albor responded by saying that the NIPD has hard-working investigators who have tracked all possible angles for any case, and that the department’s solve rate has been extremely high.

Another issue that came up was the amount of police presence within the West End. An audience member asked the mayor and police chief why more police presence wasn’t being dedicated to specific high-crime areas in the West End that were known to have the most cases of homicides and crime.

“If you know that crime’s been going on in the same area every time, on the same two streets every time, that’s where everybody needs to be because that’s where all the crime is,” he said.

DeCourt said that officers have been paid overtime to oversee areas of the city, and that the department has been trying to fully staff its department to have a full roster. He also added that cases have happened in the past where more police personnel at night led to afternoon shootings.

After being pressed on why more police weren’t in the Ann Street, Anderson Street and Bacmonila areas of the West End, D’Albor said that there hasn’t been a homicide on Ann Street in a month.

“You’re being specific on two streets and it’s not the two streets you’re describing,” D’Albor said.