The Las Vegas Metro Police Department announced Monday that officers will no longer respond to non-injury fender-bender accidents.
Officials say that officers have been stretched too thin trying to get the low-priority crashes, according to KLAS-TV.
"We've lost 30 personnel from the traffic bureau alone in the last 18 months and that's 30 officers we do not have patrolling the streets to do traffic and accident investigation," Metro Traffic Bureau Capt. Mark Tavarez said.
Currently, an average of 250 man-hours per week is spent on fender-bender investigations.
The new policy, which goes into effect on March 3, still requires officers to respond to injury accidents and hit-and-run incidents. Police will also still respond when a driver refuses to exchange insurance information.
The department hopes the new policy will allow officers to enforce laws in order to bring down the number of fatal crashes.
Departments in Los Angeles, Tucson, San Diego and San Francisco, as well as other agencies across the country no longer respond to fender benders.
