Austin Violent Crime Falls to 1,629 Cases While Drug Arrests Surge

Austin recorded 1,629 violent crime incidents from January through June 20 this year, an 8 percent decline from the 1,771 logged in the same stretch of 2025. Property crimes fell even more sharply to 11,884 incidents, a 15.3 percent drop from 14,032 the prior year. Drug crime records, however, rose 32.7 percent to 3,482.

Separate trends shape local safety picture

These three categories have moved in different directions since last year, and the divergence matters for residents tracking what happens on their streets. Violent crime has settled into a monthly pace of 275 to 301 incidents, the lowest sustained level since 2019. Property crime has followed the same downward path since 2023. Drug records tell the opposite story, with monthly counts now running between 559 and 633, the highest sustained range since at least 2016.

The Austin Police Department Incident Data that supplies these figures counts what officers log, not the underlying rate of activity. A jump in drug records can stem from stepped-up enforcement, shifts in how cases get documented, or actual changes on the ground. The numbers alone do not separate those factors.

Broader service calls also ease

Total 311 service requests through June 25 reached 137,732, down 8.3 percent from 150,161 in the corresponding period of 2025. That reduction in calls alongside the drops in violent and property crime points to less reported disorder overall, even while drug records keep climbing. Residents often use 311 to flag issues ranging from noise to abandoned property, so the trend offers one more signal that some forms of street-level trouble have eased.

The next numbers to watch are whether drug crime records stay above 550 per month through the summer or ease back toward the roughly 350 monthly average seen in 2024. Austin Police Department Incident Data through mid-June supplies the baseline for that comparison.