Mayor Brandon Johnson hopes to give the Chicago Police Department a bigger pot of cash to spend on overtime next year, but wants the money to come with strings attached.
As aldermen wrapped their heads around the plan to rein in sky-high overspending during a Wednesday hearing on the department’s 2026 budget, police Superintendent Larry Snelling welcomed the new restrictions, but defended spending an annual nine-figure sum on overtime as a necessary practice.
“There’s no way I’m ever going to sit up and tell you that it’s never going to be necessary to use overtime. We’re a police department, things happen,” Snelling said. “We have to make sure if we’re using it, that we’re using it in the most careful manner, the most responsible manner, and in order to do that, we have to have measures in place.”
The department, already the city’s largest, has consistently outspent its set budget — with the exception of 2020 — for roughly the past decade, according to the city’s annual comprehensive financial reports. Johnson’s budget proposal includes what he says is stronger oversight of overtime and efforts to move administrative jobs from costlier sworn staff to civilian professionals.
According to the Civic Federation, overtime has exceeded budget amounts for the past six years “at times by staggering amounts.” While the city budgeted $100 million for CPD overtime in 2023 and 2024, for example, it actually spent about $283 million and $238 million respectively, which either indicates unrealistic budgeting, “inefficient use of personnel, or both,” the analysis concluded.
Snelling, a Johnson appointee said his department has worked to reduce the spend, bringing down costs down $25 million compared with this time last year. “We’re keeping much better records of overtime … we use it judiciously,” he said.
The department has meanwhile underspent on regular payroll, thanks to consistent vacancies, the Civic Federation analysis found. The department has $92 million budgeted for turnover, or money expected to be saved because of unfilled new or existing vacancies.
More Top Picks How To Make A Sensory Diet For Your Child At Home
The department is expected to provide monthly reports and participate in quarterly City Council hearings on its overtime spending next year, where aldermen will decide whether the department can exceed its new overtime cap of $200 million. Police officials are required to compile a monthly report with hours of overtime within each district, the reason for the overtime and other details, including whether it is reimbursable or when officers are detailed to a sister agency such as the Park District.
Mayor Brandon Johnson, however, can directly allow the department to exceed the cap “when a bona fide emergency occurs,” according to his proposed management ordinance for 2026.
The funded, but unfilled vacancies and high overtime spending have become a target for progressive activists who argue the police budget hides “slush fund” spending.
The Public Health & Safety for Chicago coalition, made up in part of progressive groups that have backed Johnson, has called on the mayor to broadly cut vacancies and instead spend the $200 million they estimate is set aside for those empty jobs on policies such as youth jobs, violence prevention and non-police mental health response teams.
While the total amount for the Police Department in Johnson’s proposed budget exceeds this year, there is a small reduction of full-time positions. Personnel costs are higher this year because of scheduled salary and benefit increases under the city’s contract with the Fraternal Order of Police. Snelling noted Wednesday the increased salaries further drive up overtime costs.
An upcoming and long awaited workforce allocation study suggesting changes to where officers should be deployed is also expected in the months to come.
The department expects civilianization efforts — especially in communications, human resources and records — will save $100 million over 10 years. CPD and the city’s Law, HR and budget offices are supposed to collaborate on other potential positions to switch over, but won’t provide their findings until next summer.
Asked by Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez about the efforts, Snelling said the civilianization efforts are ongoing and further changes are being assessed. The civilians being hired by the department are taking on administrative work, not the typical work of sworn officers, he said.
“What we’re not doing is swapping out sworn positions for civilians,” Snelling said.
CPD has also traditionally overspent its budgeted $82.5 million for legal judgments and settlements, and will again blow by that sum — and additional money set aside in the city’s catch-all “Finance General” fund — by the end of this year.
Johnson’s finance team plans to issue bonds to help pay for a $90 million settlement to alleged victims of disgraced police Sgt. Ronald Watts, resurrecting a phased-out practice because of the “extraordinary” nature of the settlement and the long-term savings the settlement will present compared to reaching individual agreements with plaintiffs or taking each case to court.
The city borrowed for other legal settlements as recently as 2014 and 2017, but former Mayor Rahm Emanuel pledged to retire the practice by 2019 to signal to ratings agencies and other watchdogs it could set aside money to cover those costs as part of the regular budget. Johnson officials have not yet shared how much extra they expect to pay in interest for that borrowing.