With NJ attorney general running Paterson police, overtime soared to $5M in 2023

PATERSON — Total overtime payments for city police jumped by 69% — from almost $3 million in 2022 to more than $5 million in 2023 — after the New Jersey attorney general took control of the department.

Community leaders say those numbers are not surprising considering the pervasive police presence they have seen on Paterson’s streets since the state takeover, a saturation that officials have credited for a substantial reduction in violent crime last year.

“These dollars aren’t for guys just standing at stop signs. It’s paying for police officers on our main corridors; it’s high visibility,” said Assemblyman Benjie Wimberly of Paterson. “I don’t think you’d find a single resident who has a problem with this,” he added about the overtime spending.

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Activist Ernest Rucker, who has a long track record of criticizing the city’s Police Department, didn’t hesitate with his response when asked for his thoughts on the surge in overtime.

“I think it’s money well spent,” Rucker said. “It’s being put into more coverage on the streets. It’s had a tremendous impact.”

Other city departments saw drops in overtime

The city’s final 2023 overtime report, which was released to Paterson Press last week, showed year-to-year reductions in other municipal departments.

Public works went from $1.4 million in overtime in 2022 to $1.33 million in 2023, the Fire Department dropped from $1.27 million to $823,000, and health and human services fell from $166,000 to $100,000.

But the police overtime increase pushed the city’s annual total from $5.5 million to $7.5 million.

City officials said the surge in overtime spending is being paid from the $10 million in extra funding the state earmarked for the Paterson Police Department because of the attorney general’s intervention. The regular city budget covered about $2 million of Paterson’s police overtime in 2023, officials said.

Overtime was critical to stabilization efforts

Overtime assignments were a major factor in the Police Department’s neighborhood stabilization initiative that transformed Broadway last summer from a street where drug addicts roamed looking for their next fix to a place whether the red-and-blue flashing lights of police vehicles were ubiquitous.

The use of walking patrols on Broadway was expanded late last year to other troubled parts of the city. Paterson’s crime reduction — including a 33% drop in shootings and a 23% decline in robberies — outpaced other New Jersey cities.

The Police Department issued a brief statement in response to questions about the spending.

“While overtime is an important part of any police agency’s budget,” a spokesperson said, “the Paterson Police Department will continue to use a combination of creative deployment strategies, regular duty personnel and overtime allocation to ensure appropriate levels of field presence, community engagement, and detail coverage to properly staff and secure the city’s many special events.”

'Boots on the ground work': Paterson closes 2023 with major reduction in crime

'Stretched thin'

The difference in the overtime numbers before and after the takeover is dramatic. In January and February last year, the city averaged about $152,000 per month in police overtime, a Paterson Press analysis of the data showed. From April through December, after the state took control, the monthly average for overtime was about $486,000.

In September alone, the Police Department spent $953,000 on overtime, the city’s records show. Law enforcement advocates wondered whether the extra work is sustainable for city cops.

“We’re getting stretched thin,” said Angel Jimenez, president of the Paterson Policemen's Benevolent Association local.

City Council President Alex Mendez said Paterson’s police officers “are not machines.”

“They need rest,” Mendez said. “They can’t keep going like this around the clock.”

The union president and council president asserted that overtime is being used to compensate for understaffing in the Police Department. The city currently has about 400 cops. In 2011, before budget cuts resulted in layoffs, Paterson had more than 500 officers.

“We need at least 100 more police officers,” Mendez said.

Wimberly, the Assembly member, agreed that Paterson needs a larger Police Department to handle the growth the city has seen in recent years.

“The census says we’re at 160,000,” Wimberly said of Paterson’s population. “But really, we’re closer to 200,000 … We look like Brooklyn, we’re so packed.”

Mayor Andre Sayegh frequently mentions in his speeches that the city has hired more than 100 new cops since he took office. But those hirings have been negated by retirements and resignations by cops who have left Paterson to take better-paying law enforcement jobs in other towns.

Paterson’s police labor contracts expired more than five years ago and remain unresolved, a major factor, Jimenez said, in the departures to other departments.

Sayegh — who is fighting the state takeover in a lawsuit — has remained silent on whether he is trying to get the size of the Police Department increased.

A police spokesperson said the department is doing “in-depth analysis to determine the appropriate staffing level.”

Officials said they expect that the $10 million from the state will continue to pay for police overtime well into 2024. But City Hall officials said they are not sure exactly how much of the $10 million remains, partly because the funding is being used for expenses being paid directly by the state government.

Rucker, the activist, said the infusion of funding was crucial to the state takeover. “Without the extra revenue, it’s just a plan on paper,” he said.

Wimberly said he hoped the state would be able to continue financing the changes in the Police Department. He said the worst scenario for the city would be for the state funding to disappear.

Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press. Email: editor@patersonpress.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Paterson NJ: Police overtime grew to $5M in 2023