The Chicago Police Department spent more than $27 million on overtime related to the 2024 Democratic National Convention\u2014nearly $10 million more than it received in federal personnel funding, according to newly published data from the City\u2019s Office of Inspector General.<\/p>\n
The figures are part of a new interactive dashboard<\/a> launched this week by Inspector General Deborah Witzburg, who told the Weekly the tool is designed to improve transparency as the city braces for a projected $1.2 billion budget shortfall in 2026. Since January 2020, police overtime spending has exceeded $1.34 billion.<\/p>\n \u201cIn any one of a number of recent years, CPD\u2019s overtime spending alone dwarfs the entire budget of many other city departments combined,\u201d Witzburg said. \u201cThat is not necessarily itself a problem. It is just an indicator of the scale.\u201d<\/p>\n The department spent nearly $27.3 million on overtime tied to the four-day Democratic National Convention held in August. Officers worked more than 340,000 hours of overtime related to the DNC, for which they were credited almost 560,000 hours\u2019 worth of pay. Officers are credited 1.5 hours of compensation for each hour of overtime worked.<\/p>\n CPD\u2019s portion of the $75 million in federal security funding<\/a> for the convention was $17.6 million, which was meant to cover personnel, training, and operations costs. The new data shows overtime spending alone exceeded that amount by nearly 60 percent.<\/p>\n Thousands of protestors staged mostly peaceful marches during the four days of the DNC. The demonstrations were monitored by hundreds of officers<\/a> in riot gear. A few dozen protesters and at least two journalists were arrested during the convention.<\/p>\n A few reports have suggested that departments that excessively rely on overtime see higher rates of officer attrition<\/a> and increased incidents<\/a> of both excessive force complaints and vehicle crashes. Attrition has plagued CPD, with one in six officers leaving the department between 2016 and 2024, according to a Sun-Times<\/a> analysis.<\/p>\n A CPD spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n Witzburg declined to weigh in on CPD\u2019s handling of DNC spending specifically. She said the dashboard is meant to help the city better understand what drives the costs behind public safety operations.<\/p>\n \u201cThe police department is always going to have unexpected staffing needs. An entity that\u2019s in emergency response will have emergencies,\u201d Witzburg said. \u201cBut where overtime spending is of the scale which we have seen in the last few years, it is a sensible question to ask whether there are things we can learn about where we need staffing and how much that might help us better predict personnel costs.\u201d<\/p>\n CPD spent nearly $3 million in 2024 on overtime for homicide investigations, which Mayor Brandon Johnson has repeatedly<\/a> said<\/a> are a priority of his administration. Homicide detectives, who are often overburdened with large caseloads<\/a> that leave them little time to solve cases, rely on overtime to track leads, secure witness cooperation, and for court appearances.<\/p>\n According to WGN, Chicago detectives closed only 23 percent of homicides<\/a> with arrests in 2024, a figure only slightly better than what the department averaged<\/a> from 2013 until mid-October of 2023. Police in New York and Los Angeles say their homicide clearance<\/a> rates top 70 percent, by contrast.<\/p>\n Witzburg did not comment on the disparity in CPD\u2019s spending on protests versus homicides. \u201cResources are finite, both financial resources and staffing resources, and we ought to be allocating those resources in line with institutional priorities,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Witzburg added that she hopes the data will give the public and policymakers \u201ca clearer view of when and how much and how often overtime is required, so that we can plan for staffing.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2024, 11,298 CPD officers, or about 97 percent, earned overtime. Total overtime earnings exceeded $270 million that year.<\/p>\n The city budgeted $100 million for police overtime in 2025, a figure the department has already blown through. Through June of this year, the department has spent more than $119 million on overtime.\u00a0<\/p>\n The city\u2019s 2026 forecast of a $1.2 billion budget shortfall<\/a> could swell to $1.6 billion if the national economy takes a turn for the worse. CPD\u2019s $2.1 billion budget represents<\/a> nearly 46 percent of the city\u2019s discretionary spending, and despite a net reduction of 456 budgeted positions<\/a> in 2025, CPD\u2019s payroll costs are up $77 million from last year.<\/p>\n