Pittsburgh city controller warns several departments have almost depleted their overtime budgets
It's only April, but City Controller Rachael Heisler says several city departments have almost depleted their overtime budgets and she warns of a coming fiscal crisis. The Gainey administration says it has the situation under control, but council members accuse the mayor of underfunding the budget to avoid raising taxes in an election year.
Just three months into the new year, Heisler has sent a letter to city council, warning the overtime budget is being depleted, the city having already spent $11 million to date. That's 75% of Public Works' premium pay budget, 66% of Emergency Medical Services' and 87% of the Public Safety administration's allotment.
Council members say they saw it coming and on Wednesday accused the Gainey administration of grossly underfunding overtime and other areas to avoid raising taxes or making serious cuts in an election year.
"It's probably more of an election year budget, to put a good face on it," said Councilman Anthony Coghill. "But it was clear we were not going to meet the challenges of the overtime."
"We were going to run out of money, maybe after the election or something like that, and then we'd be forced to either raise taxes or cut jobs or do something more drastic," Council President Theresa Kail-Smith said.
When asked about the accusations, Deputy Mayor Jake Pawlak replied, "They're entitled to that opinion. That's not the case."
Council members estimate a $15 million shortfall in overtime alone, but while the Gainey administration concedes overtime spending is a moving target, Pawlak presented charts showing an uptick in jobs and construction starts, saying the city will have the tax revenues to cover those costs.
"We're going to continue to monitor this. In any event, we're confident that we have the flexibility to manage the cost of overtime for the year," Pawlak said.
The high overtime is mostly due to the serious understaffing of police, fire and especially EMS, which KDKA-TV recently reported racked up $6 million in overtime in 2023, with 69 employees making more than $100,000. But the Public Works overtime budget is also almost depleted, despite the hiring of more than 100 new workers. Pawlak said the money went to snow removal.
"It goes up in the beginning of the fiscal year in January and February and then again in November and December. So it's not particularly surprising to us that a big portion of the spending happened there," said Pawlak.
But council says it will begin looking at cutting non-critical areas, saying the mayor has underfunded critical areas like replacing the city's aging fleet of ambulances, Public Works trucks, police cars and fire engines.
"There's a lot of money we distribute in terms of grant funding. There's a lot of funding that we spend money on things that maybe we can hold off on," said Smith.
