Year one of the San Antonio Police Department’s Taser upgrade costs $1,300,077.68. The ten-year estimate is $22,575,980. Divide the second number by ten and you get about $2.26 million a year, nearly double the first year. The city’s agenda memo does not say why.
That gap is the most useful thing to know about item 8 on the San Antonio City Council’s Oct. 15, 2026 consent agenda, an ordinance amending the city’s contract with Axon Enterprise, Inc. to move SAPD from the Taser 7 program to the Taser 10 Certification Program and Warranty Bundle.
What the ordinance does
The amendment does two things, according to the agenda: it upgrades the program, and it rewrites the contract term as a ten-year structure with a four-year initial term beginning Oct. 15, 2026 and up to six one-year renewal options.
The agenda memorandum says the Taser 7 model SAPD now uses is being discontinued. The bundle covers the Taser 10, handle, holsters, unlimited field-use cartridges, recharging docks, rechargeable batteries, a hardware warranty and evidence.com licenses, plus training cartridges, training suits and instructor-led training. The Aviation Department and Parks and Recreation enforcement officers would also have access to the contract.
The numbers
The chart compares three per-year figures. The first is from the 2021 contract, the second is year one of the new deal, and the third is my average of the ten-year estimate.
The 2021 contract, approved June 3, 2021 under Ordinance 2021-06-03-0394, provided Taser 7 equipment for $824,180 a year over five years. It also gave the city an option to extend for five more years and receive Axon’s newest model for an estimated $1.1 million a year. On Dec. 5, 2024, Council added capacity for up to 400 more Taser 7 units, bringing SAPD’s inventory to 1,850 units, which raised the total contract amount to $11,773,693.70.
Year one of the new deal, at $1,300,077.68, is about 58% above the original $824,180 annual price and about $200,000 above the $1.1 million estimate from 2021. Those are not perfectly like-for-like: the inventory grew in 2024, and the new bundle is a different product.
Why it was on the consent agenda, and who pays
The memo says the contract was originally procured under a public health and safety exemption, that Axon is the sole manufacturer of the Taser program and the only provider of the certification and warranty bundle SAPD uses, and that the city’s Labor Relations Committee recommends the upgrade. Because of the exemption, it says no local or veteran preference was applied and no Contracts Disclosure Form is required.
Year one is funded from the General Fund FY 2027 Adopted Budget. Funding for later years “is contingent upon City Council approval of the annual budget,” in the memo’s words, so the $22.6 million is an estimate, not money Council has already set aside.
What is not known yet
- Why the average is higher than year one. The memo gives no year-by-year schedule, so the packet does not show whether prices step up or whether later years include other costs.
- The optional bundles. The memo lists a proposed additional cost of $159,402.12 for the optional 100 bundles and a $9,396,296 total over the term. It does not show how one becomes the other.
- The vote. The agenda and packet do not show how Council voted on Oct. 15, and no readable minutes were found, so this story describes the item as proposed.
- The departments’ side. Neither document includes a statement from SAPD or Axon about the contract.
Stay hydrated, stay curious, stay off 410 at 5pm. — Nico