San Diego Police Routinely Blow Past Overtime Budgets

Speaker 1: 00:00 In addition to the demonstrations in Lamesa protests over the killing of George Floyd brought thousands of protestors into downtown San Diego and San Diego police were deployed at full force at the site of those protests in the aftermath of the rallies and demonstrations, activists have been calling on city leaders to cut the police budget and give more money to libraries, parks, and affordable housing. But as KPBS Metro reporter, Andrew Bowen explains even when its budgets are lean, SDPD has a track record of overspending Speaker 2: 00:37 On May 31st thousands of San Diegans gathered in downtown San Diego to protest the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer that afternoon and evening police declared an unlawful assembly and used tear gas, Sten, grenades, and pepper balls to disperse. The crowds protestors said that escalated and otherwise peaceful demonstration while police say it was necessary to secure the area either way. It was an expensive day for city taxpayers in the following days and weeks, police racked up more than 100,000 hours of overtime responding to protests by mid June, SDPD had blown past its overtime budget by more than $11 million. And the overspending is not a fluke, a KPBS review of city budgets and financial reports found to SDPD has spent beyond its overtime budget in all of the past 10 fiscal years together. The decade of overspending totals, more than $61 million. Our office has raised concerns with police overtime, exceeding budgeted levels quite consistently, but coop Patel is a fiscal and policy analyst with the independent budget analysts office. Speaker 2: 01:50 All departments have a responsibility to spend within their budget. Um, including the police department, police department is a little unique because especially the use of overtime, uh, if there's an emergency or a public safety issue that needs to be addressed, typically that's done through overtime. Some overtime pay is also mandatory. Officers are guaranteed overtime when they work on holidays, for example, or have to appear in court. But the biggest portion of the police overtime budget is discretionary. When police captains allow officers to work beyond their regular eight hours, we have to be honest about where the desire for policing comes from Kira green is executive director of the progressive think tank center on policy initiatives. Police have justified extending shifts into overtime by saying the department is understaffed green disagrees and says the use of overtime reflects the over-policing of some San Diego neighborhoods. It's always the case that policing is racialized. And so as this city has become more people of color we've. Now we've heard a call for more policing and that's not going to solve our problems. It's actually is our problem. Green says is consistent overspending on overtime could mean one of two things, either all the mayors and police chiefs over the past decade have been really bad at predicting how much the department would need to spend on overtime. Or Speaker 3: 03:12 What we think is more true is that this is an intentional decision not to be upfront about the cost that we're putting into policing and to do at the front end of the budget cuts and all kinds of programs under the argument that there's not enough money. And then on the back end of the budget to put that money back into place, Speaker 2: 03:28 SDPD declined our request for an interview and refuse to respond to written questions about overtime spending council, president George at Gomez says the police budget does need more scrutiny to that end. She and council member Monica Montgomery commissioned a deep dive report into police spending. So the council can find areas to cut responsible. Speaker 1: 03:48 So when we are having the budget discussion and the budget allocations, we can actually make decisions based on that information. Versus when we're in the official budget hearings, it makes it hard because a lot of the information is coming at us very, very quickly, but also at times, very late, Speaker 2: 04:07 Despite a flood of calls to cut the police budget council members last month approved mayor Kevin falconer's proposal to increase it by about 5% to $566 million. The police overtime budget also went up to about 34 million, but in an effort to crack down on overspending, the council is also requiring SDPD to provide a detailed account of overtime use. As soon as half of the budget is exhausted. Council member, Chris ward, who cast the only vote against the budget says this is the level of oversight needed right now. Speaker 1: 04:41 I think that what you're hearing from many council representatives is an increased interest in engaging directly with police operations and with, with the police budget itself, to be a little more transparent and clear about what it is we're doing, how we're spending it and what other alternatives might be out there for consideration. Speaker 2: 04:58 The deep dive report on SDPD budget is expected sometime in the late summer or fall. Speaker 1: 05:04 Joining me is KPBS Metro reporter Andrew Bowen. Speaker 2: 05:08 Andrew. Welcome. Thank you, Maureen. Speaker 1: 05:11 No, it was just a few years ago that the big issue with police in San Diego was that there weren't enough of them and that the city wasn't paying enough to recruit or retain enough police officers. How has that situation changed? Speaker 2: 05:25 Well in 2017, mayor Kevin Faulkner struck a deal with the police officer's association to give them a series of raises. And, uh, it's true that SDPD offered relatively low pay compared to other, uh, comparative agencies, uh, like the Sheriff's department or police departments and the neighboring cities. And so those raises really, um, uh, brought SDPD up to par with some of those other agencies. They were, they were approved also unanimously by the city council. So that certainly reflects how times have changed. Um, but since then the have been steadily building up their staffing levels, filling some of those vacant positions with new recruits. They're not where they want to be right now, but they have definitely made a lot of progress. And one thing that I learned in reporting this story is that the council hasn't really had an in depth conversation about the number of officers that the department needs. The goal has always been to get to the staffing levels seen before the great recession. Um, but now we're seeing more interest from the council and taking a closer look at those numbers and perhaps, maybe they'll decide that we can do okay with the number of officers that we have right now. Speaker 1: 06:32 Now over the 10 years that you looked at wasn't overtime pay sometimes use to boost an officer's overall compensation. Speaker 2: 06:40 I can't say whether that was the intent of overtime. Um, it is true that, uh, in 2012 proposition B froze the pay of, um, virtually all city employees. Um, but any overtime hours that the off police officers earned during that period, certainly helped their pay and browsing through some of the salary data that we found. Uh, some officers earned $0 million in overtime. Others might've had half of their earnings at the end of the year, uh, from overtime. So it definitely provided a big pay boost to certain people. Speaker 1: 07:11 Do we know how most of the police overtime pay is spent? Speaker 2: 07:16 It's not easy information to find. Uh, I can say that the independent budget analyst office was a big help, as I mentioned in their story. Police chose not to give us an interview or ANSI answer any of our questions in writing, but we did get a memo that was released in response to some council member questions. And about a third of the, uh, overtime budget was listed as extension of shift. That's when officers are working past their eight hours, just to keep more, uh, police officers on the beat, walking the streets, et cetera. And that's the biggest portion about a 10th of the overtime budget was listed as going to holiday pay, uh, and about a quarter was categorized as other, and with some more digging, we found out this is actually related to a lot of the policing of homelessness. So officers, for example, a company, civilian city staffers, while they clear homeless encampments in case there's some sort of confrontation and also neighborhood policing is a new division that was created by the department in 2018 to centralize a lot of the quality of life complaints that they respond to many of which are related to homelessness. Speaker 2: 08:22 So this is absolutely the overtime budget growing is absolutely connected to the city's use of the police department to respond to homelessness. Speaker 1: 08:31 Now, Kira green, Oh, the center for policy initiatives told you communities of color are not asking for more police to make them feel safer. But former district attorney Paul thinks told us on this show last week, that when he had town hall meetings, he was always asked by the community for more police in the neighborhood that was in the early two thousands. So is it fair to say attitudes have shifted and are it's a hard question Speaker 2: 08:57 Answer? I think it's fair to say communities are pretty divided on whether police presence makes their communities safer. Uh, council president Georgette Gomez told me in our interview that after a recent shooting in her district, she also got a flood of emails and calls for more police presence. Um, but it's also true that many in San Diego simply don't trust the police and see them as more of a threat to their safety. So our attitudes changing, I think it's hard to say, but definitely based on the size and the frequency of the protests that we saw against police violence in recent months, I think more people and in particular, more white people are viewing the police with a lot more skepticism than they did before, Speaker 1: 09:34 Or considering the moment that we're in. Why did the San Diego city council vote to raise the police budget? Speaker 2: 09:41 Well, the main reason, and it is true, uh, was that the city had promised salary and benefit increases for the police. Uh, and those personnel costs are pretty baked into the budget. Um, the mayor and city council could have chosen to reduce the budgeted positions in the police department. Uh, there was a hiring freeze in most city departments after COVID-19 hit the budget really hard. And there were even a few layoffs. Um, but, uh, the police were mostly spared from that. It's also true that these calls to defund the police were not a major part of the discourse in San Diego before George Floyd's death. The police department had a budget review committee, a hearing on May 4th when they presented their budget in greater detail. And that was three weeks before George Floyd's, uh, killing by a police officer. And so, uh, you know, if there had been 10 hours of public testimony in that hearing, or if this whole conversation had started earlier than there might've been a different outcome, but it was fairly hard to change. Um, on the day that the city council was approving the police budget. Speaker 1: 10:41 And is the police department unique among city agencies in blowing past its overtime budget? Speaker 2: 10:47 It's not the fire department is the other main, uh, sort of culprit in this, um, spending beyond its overtime budget. And that's also been called out as an issue in the IBA reports over the years. Uh, one thing that we did learn was that the fire department, uh, at least in the most recent fiscal year did have higher vacancy savings. Um, and this is when you know, you budget for a position that ultimately you can't fill. So that's money that set aside that was unspent. And often that offsets over time spending those vacancy savings were higher in the fire department than they were in the police department. So kind of the overall budget balance, um, is greater in the, or at least most recently was greater in the police department in terms of actually overspending. Overall. Speaker 1: 11:30 I've been speaking with KPBS, Metro reporter, Andrew Bowen, Andrew. Thank you. Thank you, Maureen tune in tomorrow for a closer look at calls to shift money from policing to mental health services.