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Deputy Mayor says overtime and front-line staffing drove tough tradeoffs, defends retaining Safe Passage
Summary
Deputy Mayor Lindsay Appiah told the committee DMPSJ's FY27 proposal prioritizes front-line staffing and overtime needs across the public-safety cluster, leading to the exclusion of some grant lines (Safe Commercial Corridors and Safe & Secure nonprofit grants) while maintaining Safe Passage funding; she and staff urged continued partnership as the council considers restorations.
Deputy Mayor Lindsay Appiah told the Committee on Judiciary and Public Safety that difficult choices in the mayor's FY27 proposed budget were driven by constrained revenue and sharply higher overtime costs across public-safety agencies.
Appiah said the cluster-level FY27 proposal for DMPSJ is $12,500,000 with 27 FTEs and that a significant portion of that allocation supports Safe Passage and Safe Blocks programming that helps students travel to and from school. She explained that cluster overtime projections and legally required personnel costs left limited non-personnel funds to sustain some discretionary grant lines.
As a result, the mayor's proposal does not include funding for the Safe Commercial Corridors grants or the Safe and Secure DC nonprofit security fund. Appiah said the administration found funds to disburse emergency top-ups in FY26 (an additional $10,000 per grantee after recent national incidents), but that FY27 trade-offs prioritized core operations and overtime where local and federal demands on city agencies are greatest.
Appiah emphasized the administration's preference to restore small grants if the council can identify offsets, and said the city continues to pursue federal overtime reimbursement (EPSF) and other federal supports. "A significant portion of DMPSJ's proposed FY27 budget is funding for the Safe Passages, Safe Blocks program," Appiah said; she and council members agreed to continue negotiations on grant restorations.
