NYC Cuts Overtime Pay for Police Amid Growing Migrant Crisis
New York City is planning to cut overtime pay for officers, first responders, and other agencies to secure additional funding to handle the growing migrant crisis.
The announcement came just days before the nation would commemorate the 22 anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks, and honor the loss of 386 first responders who passed away that day, as well as the 341 individuals who have died from illnesses as a result.
Shortly after Mayor Eric Adams said that the migration crisis would “destroy New York City,” he asked all city agencies to “submit a plan to reduce their city-funded spending” to allocate more funds to manage the 10,000 migrants arriving in the city each month.
The budget director for Mayor Eric Adams’s administration, Jacques Jiha, sent a memo to New York City’s police, fire, corrections, and sanitation departments, instructing them to submit an overtime pay reduction plan “to reduce year-to-year OT spending.” Jiha reported told the departments to submit monthly reports “to track overtime spending and their progress in meeting the reduction target” once Adams issues the order, according to the National Review.
“Since the large influx of asylum seekers to our city began last spring, we have warned New Yorkers that every city service could be impacted by this crisis if we did not get the support we needed,” Mayor Adams said in a press release. “Our city continues to receive approximately 10,000 asylum seekers each month, and, as we laid out last month, we anticipate spending $12 billion through the end of Fiscal Year 2025 if circumstances do not change.”
“While our compassion is limitless, our resources are not,” he added. “At this time, we are asking all of our agencies to submit a plan to reduce their city-funded spending . . . If we can get the substantial support we need from our federal and state partners, we can avoid these funding reductions.”
Several city officials who publicly acknowledged the proposed budget cuts in the press release applied pressure on state and federal agencies to secure more funding for the city. The Mayor insisted that the city “need[s] Washington and Albany to finally do their part by paying their fair share and coming up with a decompression strategy that reduces the pressure on New York City, so we are not forced to manage this crisis almost entirely on our own.”
The New York Post reported that the proposed overtime pay cuts wouldn’t be in the city’s financial interest, according to one source who explained why the move is a bad idea.
“‘We’re already at critical staffing levels, and it’s cheaper to pay overtime than it is to hire another officer,’ the source said, explaining that health care and other benefits had already been paid for when an existing officer picks up a shift.”
New York Post
The head of the Police Benevolent Association, Patrick Hendry, criticized the memo as well, noting several drawbacks of the plan.
“It is going to be impossible for the NYPD to significantly reduce overtime unless it fixes its staffing crisis,” Hendry said. “We are still thousands of cops short, and we’re struggling to drive crime back to pre-2020 levels without adequate personnel.”
