STAMFORD - The city is asking for $1.6 million in emergency funds to cover the police department's overtime spending this year.
City officials expect to make up for the extra spending because it has contingency funds and likely will spend less than expected on officer salaries.
'We will probably break even,' said Peter Privitera, the budget director.
The city budgeted $2.6 million for police overtime in 2007-08, but the department already spent almost that amount after a series of labor-intensive homicide investigations.
Three homicides committed since September remain unsolved, and the investigations take extra manpower, said Capt. Richard Conklin, head of the detective bureau.
All three homicides are shooting cases. On Sept. 3, a gunman fatally shot Schneider Malan, an alleged drug dealer, once in the chest on the East Side. At least one suspect in that murder is in custody on charges of killing a Norwalk man on Christmas night, court records show.
About three months later, a gunman fired multiple shots at Gregory Rowell, 22, as Rowell sat in the driver's seat of his parked car on Myano Lane on Dec. 4. Police have said they have leads in the case but it's been difficult to get witnesses to cooperate.
In the most recent unsolved homicide, Marco Paoletta Jr., 51, was shot in the head after he left his racquetball game at the Jewish Community Center on Jan. 3. Police found Paoletta's body on Vine Road near Turn of River Middle School about 6:30 p.m. Authorities found his car on fire in Norwalk five hours later.
Police also spent overtime money flying officers to Louisiana and other states to extradite prisoners, Conklin said.
Still, the department expects to spend less on overtime this year than the record $4.8 million it spent in each of the last two fiscal years.
The overtime budget would hit about $4.2 million if the department spends all of the $1.6 million in emergency funds that city boards are expected to approve.
The city set aside $800,000 of the $1.6 million in a contingency budget in case police spent extra on overtime, Privitera said. The other $800,000 is newly appropriated money.
Costs are dropping primarily because the department beefed up patrol squads to prevent staff shortages on any shift. When the department is short of the minimum number of officers on a shift, it must fill the gaps with officers paid at overtime rates. Such spending has accounted for about half the department's overtime budget in past years, city records show.
Chief Brent Larrabee recently shifted officers out of several special units, including the school resource unit, and into the patrol squad. Larrabee has said overtime could be lower if he hired 18 officers.
Privitera said the 18 vacancies will help the city cover this year's overtime expenses. The city set aside $2.4 million this year for back pay that came due to officers once their new contract was finalized in October.
The back pay likely will be less because the department has fewer officers than expected. Money left over from that $2.4 million pot will go toward overtime, Privitera said.
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