By Vesna Jaksic
Staff Writer
June 18, 2006
STAMFORD -- The Police Department has spent nearly $46,000 this year paying officers for 881 hours they did not work due to a contractual obligation.
The figure is small compared with the department's overall $46 million budget, but it is one of several highlighted by Board of Finance member Joseph Tarzia.
"Why are we wasting so much of our tax dollars for work that's not being done?" he said. "This has been going on for years. And it's quite a sum of money."
The police union contract requires officers to be paid a minimum of four hours for 1.5 times their normal rate every time they are called back to duty, even if they work less than four hours. From January to the end of May, officers were called back in 417 instances and paid the contractual minimum while working less than four hours, according to a police memo issued at Tarzia's request.
Tarzia is not a member of the board's Public Safety Committee, but he said he brought up the issue during a committee meeting last week. Committee members plan to start meeting monthly to discuss police and fire department budgets to better track spending.
"We just want to more or less track various expenses on a monthly basis just so at the end of the fiscal year there are no surprises," committee member Bob Kolenberg said.
Tim Abbazia, chairman of the Public Safety Committee, said the fire and police departments need computerized data for better analysis.
"It's not necessarily something we're looking to do to control costs -- although by doing this, costs typically get more attention, and you do typically manage costs better -- but if this report tells us we're really not spending enough on patrol, that's something we want to know as well," he said. "It can go either way."
Money spent on overtime for "callbacks" is only a small portion of the police department's overtime budget. This year, it expects to spend $4.5 million on overtime pay, an increase from $3.6 million last year, said Peter Privitera, director of the Office of Policy and Management. But last year, the department had about $200,000 to $250,000 more in state and federal grants to offset overtime costs, Privitera said.
The department's 30 vacancies have led to most of the overtime costs this year, but some have resulted from an increase in crime, Privitera said. As for the money spent on hours officers did not work during the callback, Privitera and Kolenberg said nothing can be done.
"That is in the contract, and that is what it is," Privitera said.
Police spokesman Lt. Sean Cooney said the four-hour minimum pay after officers are called back to duty is justified.
"Basically, the idea is that if you're going to call somebody from home -- even if the job is over in five minutes or an hour, or an hour and a half -- to call them on their off-duty time, you need to compensate them," he said. "It's fair and reasonable compensation."
Stamford Police Association President Michael Merenda said it is only fair to compensate officers for being available.
"Who in their right mind is going to come in on their day off when they are with their families, at a birthday party or a graduation?" he said. "It's not really fair if they come in and they get paid for only one hour."
The clause has been in the contract for years and is common among police unions and other service industries in which workers need to be available off-duty, city officials said.
Abbazia said the callback is an example of an area in which officials need more information.
"One needs to know how much it cost us this year and how it compares to last year," he said. "Once we have data to compare it to, we can see if it's being abused or not. It's certainly a valid issue to address, but before we jump to any conclusion we do need to build more data."
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