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Glendale proposes $4 million police overtime increase as staffing levels change; council debates whether added officers will cut overtime
Summary
Staff told council that fully staffing police reduced vacancy savings and revealed persistent overtime needs; staff proposed a $4 million increase to the police overtime budget, while council members said hiring additional officers should reduce overtime demand over time.
City staff told the Glendale City Council that overtime across public safety departments has been a long‑running driver of higher expenditures and that a change in staffing levels has uncovered the true overtime costs for police.
Staff presented five years of overtime budget‑to‑actuals and said the police overtime budget was historically underfunded. John Tocalian, acting finance director, said that in 2024–25 the city budgeted $5.3 million for overtime but spent $9.8 million; for police the gap was similarly large. To align the budget with current usage, staff proposed increasing the police overtime budget by $4 million to reach a roughly $8 million baseline going forward.
Council members asked whether adding 25 police officers (a separate staffing plan discussed in prior sessions) would reduce overtime. Police staffing and finance staff said increased staffing should reduce overtime used to backfill vacancies, but nondiscretionary overtime tied to MOUs, mandatory training, mutual aid and incidents could persist. "A big portion of the overtime expenditure at the police department for the last several years has been exactly what you just said, staffing," staff said, adding the increase would be paired with a deployment and scheduling plan as staffing grows.
Council members pressed for clearer scheduling and deployment plans and urged staff to show how hiring will affect overtime levels before permanently increasing the ongoing budget. The city manager and assistant city manager said they expect to limit future overtime as the department grows, but they cautioned that certain events (regional emergencies, civil unrest, community events) can temporarily drive overtime above baseline levels.
No formal vote was taken; the overtime proposal was presented as a recommended change to be finalized in the proposed budget ahead of the June 24 public hearing.
