After years of increases to the Boston police budget, in June 2020 our collective movement won a decrease from $414 million to $404 million. In 2021 and 2022, we won further decreases to $395 million.
However, after Michelle Wu became Mayor, she has increased the police budget, first to $405 million in 2023 and now with a proposed $455 million in 2024. In June, she changed that $455 million proposal to $474 million, a $69 million increase.
The Mayor’s proposed increase to the 2024-2025 police budget includes:
Mega-classes for 200 new police officers, higher than under past Mayors
$6.7 million in additional funding for overtime
$5.1 million in additional funding for equipment and contracts
Increases to Permanent Employees Line Item,
Including Mega-Classes and Ghost Funds
FY24 Budget adopted June 2023: $311,400,310
Mayor’s Proposed FY25 Budget: $349,822,470 (and then changed in June 2024 to add another $10-20 million)
Increase: $38,422,160
Underpsending in FY24: $6.1 Million
The increase includes:
Mega-classes: The Mayor expanded police classes and is planning to hire 200 new officers. Instituting a hiring freeze would allow putting money into community solutions that create safety and wellbeing, and prevent violence. Cost: $7.6 million (6½ months of a $70,000/yr salary) plus ongoing salaries.
Ghost funds for police vacancies: Every year, BPD underspends its Permanent Employees line item. (See the City Council’s own chart below.) This has been $6.1-$7.7 million in recent years. There is no need to include an inflated budget for permanent employees.
Increases to Overtime, Despite Contract Reforms
Despite the intention to decrease overtime in the contract, individual officers’ overtime was not capped and the budget went up. Many officers still make more than 50% of their income on overtime, and many officers willingly sign up for many extra overtime shifts.
Adding police officers does not decrease overtime, as the ACLU’s research shows:
Equipment and CONTRACTed SErviceS Increases, Despite Equipment Underspending
FY24 Equipment (Lease/Purchase) Budget adopted June 2023: $5,624,992
Mayor’s Proposed FY25 Budget: $7,588,974
Increase: $1,963,982
City Council’s Proposed FY25 Budget: $7,088,974
Increase: $1,463,982
Underspending in FY23: $982,671
FY24 Contracted Services Budget adopted June 2023: $26,645,951
Mayor’s Proposed FY25 Budget: $29,783,799
Increase: $3,137,848
The budgets for equipment (lease/purchase) and contractual services are going up by $5.1 million. This is despite repeated underspending for the lease/purchase line item. See the City Council’s own chart below:
How To Find the Police Budget
The City budget is very hard to navigate!
The City of Boston’s budget website is: https://www.boston.gov/departments/budget
On the website, there are budgets for “fiscal years.” A “fiscal year” lasts from July through June instead of January through December: for example, FY25 (fiscal year 2025) goes from July 2024 to June 2025.
There are different parts of the budget, including the operating budget, school budget, and capital budget.
The operating budget is what people typically think of in a budget, except for schools: funding for different departments, employees, programs, etc.
The school budget for Boston Public Schools
The capital budget, which is a multi-year plan for buildings and infrastructure
The “Operating Budget” link opens up a document which has an overview of the entire operating budget, and how much money each department gets. The “Public Safety” links opens up a document that includes more details about various departments including the Police Department.
In the overview page of the Operating Budget, there is a table called “General Fund Appropriations by Cabinet & Department”:
The second-to-right column gives the budget that was approved (or for FY25, the budget that is being approved) for each department. Here are the exact amounts of the approved FY19-FY24 police budgets and the proposed FY25 budget:
FY20: $414,237,378
FY21: $404,182,026
FY22: $399,871,217
FY23: $395,094,796
FY24: $404,973,193
FY25 (Proposed): $454,893,961
Note: The budget documents sometimes list some retroactive changes that happen after the official budget is approved. For example, the FY24 budget was approved at $405 million. Based on police contracts that Michelle Wu signed, her budget office estimated needing to change the FY24 budget to $444 million.