Gov. Martin O?Malley said he found no surprises in the millions of dollars spent on overtime by Baltimore City police because under his mayoral administration, the city consistently underbudgeted police overtime.
But using overtime to increase police coverage can also enhance public safety, O?Malley told The Examiner. “In fact, overtime policing is a bit of a force multiplier” because it keeps more patrol officers on the street.
Based on figures supplied by the city finance department, The Examiner reported last week that the police department spent $37 million in overtime last year. The department disputes that, saying it paid out $29 million, but that is still far more than the $8 million it was budgeted.
The review of salaries is part of an ongoing series of stories The Examiner is writing that looks at all state, county and city salaries and overtime.
“We would always underbudget for it,” O?Malley said, noting he argued with his own budget team that it should increase the overtime for police to reflect real use. But he said the fiscal planners told him that if he increased the overtime allotment, the police would spend even more money.
“There is a certain tipping point” at which overtime use is less effective than adding more police officers, O?Malley said. “It?s a struggle every day in a city” beset by violence and the drug trade, he said. The problems became worse when the federal COPS (Community Oriented Policing Services) grants instituted by former President Bill Clinton were phased out, O?Malley added.
City Hall tried to keep tabs on overtime use through the biweekly meeting of CitiStat and received detailed reports on overtime use by individual officers and police units, he said. Those meetings would identify what O?Malley called “frequent fliers” ? police officers who were recording substantial extra hours.
The city data showed that 121 police officers made more than $100,000 last year and the top 10 earners got more than double their pay. Some are under investigation on suspicion of fraud.
O?Malley said it is harder to get officers to put more overtime into foot patrol because they would rather accept the equally lucrative pay for working stadium events.
Read Michael Olesker’s column ‘Albert Marcus: Still ‘Mad Dog’ of BCPD?’
