Officers’ Overtime Creates Budget Bind Lack Of Cops Means Extra Expenses, But There’s Little Money To Expand Force

Some law enforcement officers rake in almost as much overtime pay as the average Spokane resident makes each year.

Overtime increases salaries as much as $20,000 a year - slightly less than Spokane’s average yearly income of $22,813.

Top earners love the extra money, but some say too much overtime can take its toll on family life and lead to tension in the workplace.

While county commissioners and the City Council struggle to rein in spending, they complain that overtime costs for the police and sheriff’s departments remain out of control.

The nature of police work demands some overtime, but extra hours worked by some city and county officers raise questions about whether it might be cheaper to hire new officers.

Nearly every county department - except law enforcement and courts - swallowed a 3.5 percent spending cut when commissioners approved their 1996 budget last week.

At the same time, ballooning overtime caused commissioners to give Sheriff John Goldman $2.2 million in emergency money to hire 10 more deputies and 10 corrections officers.

Of that, $600,000 came from dwindling reserves.

The rest will come from the new sales tax voters approved last month. Voters OK’d the increase to pay for jails and better juvenile detention facilities.

In an 11th-hour budget session, the City Council agreed last week to hire eight police officers in 1996. But those new officers will only maintain current staffing levels due to attrition.

They also won’t be on patrol until late next year, and city leaders don’t know how they will pay for them in 1997.

Cuts are proposed for nearly every city department - police included. Even the popular Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program is on the chopping block.

Police expect to spend $1.6 million in overtime by New Year’s. Chief Terry Mangan is pledging to cut overtime by $500,000 next year.

Even he questions if that’s realistic.

During a recent council meeting, two-term Councilman Joel Crosby told the chief he doubted the likelihood of such a drastic cut. “In my experience … I’ve never seen that happen.”

“Neither have I,” Mangan said.

Even with more sheriff’s deputies being hired, they must be trained in the academy and in the field. That means any overtime costs won’t drop until late next year, Goldman said.

Tired of seeing Goldman with his hand out, Commissioner Steve Hasson recently quipped: “We’ve got a vampire sheriff. He’s like Lazarus: he keeps rising from the dead. We need a mirror, a cross and a wooden stake inside and outside his coffin.”

Goldman said overtime represents less than 8 percent of his total payroll.

City overtime accounts for about 12 percent of the police payroll, which is on the high end of the national average of 8 to 12 percent, Mangan said. “We wouldn’t have that if we had enough people,” he said.

Managers blame ever-increasing violent crime for much of the burgeoning overtime. In the city, the latest available figures through August show burglaries, thefts and assaults down slightly, but rapes, robberies and murders way up.

The city reports 21 murders so far this year, breaking the 1983 record of 19. In unincorporated Spokane County, violent crime is up 25 percent since 1993.

More serious crime means longer investigations, and requires more overtime, said Assistant City Manager Bill Pupo.

“Police business is the business of unexpected events,” Pupo said. “You can’t schedule it on a calender.”

An average emergency such as a hostage situation or a murder costs police $10,000 to $18,000 in overtime, Mangan said.

Even day-to-day police work doesn’t allow for neat, eight- or 10-hour shifts, he said.

An officer can’t ignore a call because it’s time to go home. Courts don’t schedule trials around an officer’s day off.

Union and civil service rules further complicate the overtime situation. For example, officers called out on a day off get four hours’ pay, even if they work less than that.

The federal Fair Labor Standards Act throws in another kink. Anytime an employee goes anywhere as a police officer - a neighborhood meeting or community gathering - the city pays.

“We cannot allow our personnel to donate their time for any event where we would normally pay them, by law,” Mangan said. “They can’t volunteer their time.

For example, DARE officers at the Interstate Fair get paid overtime.

On average, a city police officer can expect $4,000 to $6,000 annually in added pay. But some officers are overtime gluttons.

As of Dec. 1, eight city officers earned more than $15,000 in overtime this year. Ten county deputies and eight corrections officers earned more than $10,000 by mid-November.

Officers who work large amounts of overtime often have a specialty - they’re on the SWAT team, bomb squad or they train new officers in the field. Others work as neighborhood resource officers or detectives, going to night meetings and after-hours events.

Many volunteer for any and all overtime that comes along - special events, fill-in work, holidays. Police union rules say the most senior officers get the first shot at events such as the Lilac Parade or Bloomsday rather than the less expensive junior officers.

There’s even extra-duty pay, where officers work special events for other agencies such as the Spokane Arena. The agency pays the city, which in turn pays the cops. That represents only about 10 percent of overtime.

“We have a few people who are notorious,” said Capt. Chuck Bown of the patrol division. “They sign up for everything that comes along.”

One of his bosses, Assistant City Manager Pupo, doesn’t see it that way. That kind of devotion needs to be encouraged, he said. “That’s a very highly motivated employee.”

Officer Kevin Peden said he’d be happy to share the wealth. He earned $18,382 in overtime by Dec. 1.

“If you had more people, the work would be spread out more,” Peden said. “The majority of people who have a lot of overtime fill in places where there weren’t enough people to do the job.”

Peden, a field training officer and a tactical team member, said he grabs the extra cash because it allows his wife to stay home with their 4-year-old daughter.

“I have too much overtime,” admitted Cpl. James Muzatko, a 23-year veteran who by Dec. 1 topped off his $47,216 in base pay with nearly $17,465 in overtime.

Muzatko, who works graveyard patrol, blames much of his overtime on violent crimes that keep him on the job after his shift ends. He also is a leader of the tactical team, which specializes in crowd control.

Mangan calls Muzatko “one of the highest producers in terms of arrests. If I could clone him, it would be great.”

County Deputy Dave Reagan is an admitted “workaholic” also motivated by the color of money. He earned nearly $15,000 in overtime by mid-November and is using it to pay off his “toys” - which include a boat and camper.

The 15-year veteran admitted overtime is an ongoing source of angst in his department, leaving many of his colleagues “cranky.”

“The downside to that is you’re tired all the time, and I don’t think you’re as sharp,” Reagan said. “I suspect we’re paying more in overtime than we would be to hire people to bring us up to staff.

“We’re being penny wise and pound foolish.”

Deputy Tom DiBartolo patrols Spokane County from the west city limits to the Lincoln County line, often by himself.

He’s a firm believer in Murphy’s Law: When DiBartolo is on the east side of his patrol area, his calls come from the west, and vice versa.

By the time he arrives at a crime scene or accident, his shift may be ending. That often means overtime for the husband and father of five children.

“It’s sort of bad that every now and then you have to get reintroduced to your children,” said the 17-year deputy. “We don’t have any flexibility because we’re always at minimum staff.”

For DiBartolo, the challenge is balancing the windfall with his sanity.

“The money is a good appeal, let’s face it. It would be ridiculous for someone to say, ‘I don’t like working for 50 percent more.’ But you have to balance that with your own health and your family’s health.

“Life is not all work.”

Capt. Bown said he closely monitors overtime numbers each month to see who’s working the most. Officers who work a lot of overtime and then take a lot of sick pay are going to be noticed. They’re also going to end up in their supervisor’s office for a talk.

“We look at performance rather than time,” Bown said, adding he’s trying “new juggling routines” in 1996 aimed at reducing overtime. That includes overlapping some shifts to trim extra hours.

Mangan said he would like to hire even more officers, but putting more cops on the street won’t solve the problem.

Salary, benefits and equipment for a new officer run about $40,000, said Police Administrator Dave Ingle.

Support services - more cars, more office staff, record keepers, etc. - nearly double the price.

Converting the total $1.6 million overtime budget into new staff would yield 20 cops, but that’s not really possible. Overtime always is part of the job.

In fact, some argue, more cops could mean more overtime - more arrests, more court time, more reportwriting.

Considering days off, adding five officers puts one more police car on the street each shift, Mangan said. “There’s a point of diminishing returns.”

Mangan plans to reduce overtime by cutting the hours officers spend at community functions like fairs, neighborhood events and volunteer outings.

That means the department’s 300 volunteers already used to decrease overtime costs will be more visible, while police will be less.

Even use of volunteers comes with an overtime expense, Mangan said.

By Dec. 1, Officer Bob Walker had earned nearly $19,000 in overtime coordinating volunteer events.

His senior citizen volunteers and Law Enforcement Explorers show up at crime scenes to aid perimeter patrols and searches.

They give out information at City Hall and the Public Safety Building. They do vacation-home checks and security surveys.

“It would cost us a lot more to use paid officers,”’ Mangan said. “Bob winds up involved in a tremendous amount of projects. He’s very generous.”

Walker also meets with his Explorers on evenings and weekends, traveling with the group to national competitions.

“The pace gets kind of wild,” Walker said.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo 2 Graphics: 1. Law enforcement overtime expenses 2. Top overtime earners