MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee Common Council is less than a month away from voting on next year's city budget. On Monday, the Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) spent over three hours explaining to members of the Finance and Personnel Committee how they plan to use their portion of the funding.
It includes hiring more staff, buying new squad cars, and updating equipment—all with the hope of lowering response times and enhancing efficiency.
“We recognize that we here at the Milwaukee Police Department are stewards of the taxpayer trust and funding,” said Heather Hough, the department’s Chief of Staff. “We want to make sure that we are doing everything possible to make sure we're as efficient as we can be.”
The proposed price tag on the table is $313,238,753 for the department's funding: 4% more than in last year's budget. One of the biggest goals is to fill the department's staffing shortage.
“Recruiting and hiring people remains a challenge,” said Hough.
Currently, there are 1,639 filled law enforcement positions and 192 vacancies.
For civilian positions in the department, there are 370 filled and 417 vacancies.
2024 is also on track to have the lowest number of filled positions since 2018.
In addition, the budget sets aside $4 million to get 60 new squad cars and $20 million to update radios, computers, and building repairs.
Police department reps say these improvements are in hopes of bringing down response times which have risen over the past year. It’s something committee members, like 14th district Alderwoman Marina Dimitrijevic and her constituents, are also concerned about.
“I still hear from my constituents on the lower priority calls that they're waiting up to 30 minutes at times,” Dimitrijevic said.
Police Chief Jeffery Norman says despite setbacks, serious crime reduction is slowly moving in the right direction.
“I believe we're in a better place than we used to be, but there’s still so much more to do.”
The Finance and Personnel Committee will amend the full budget on October 27, before the full Common Council takes a vote on November 3.
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