Politics

Chicago Spent $212M on Police Overtime So Far This Year, 6% More Than New Limit Set for 2026

The city of Chicago spent more than $212 million on overtime for members of the Chicago Police Department in just the first 10 months of 2025 — 6% more than the amount Mayor Brandon Johnson plans to set aside for police overtime in all of 2026, records show.

Chicago Police Supt. Larry Snelling told the Chicago City Council on Nov. 5 that he was confident that CPD would be able to spend no more than $200 million on overtime in 2026.

However, CPD is on track to spend at least $241 million on overtime by the end of 2025, according to a WTTW analysis based on data published by Inspector General Deborah Witzburg.

When members of the Budget and Government Operations Committee pressed Snelling to detail why CPD is set to exceed its annual overtime budget for the eighth straight year, Snelling said he would not hesitate to order officers to work extra hours to keep the people of Chicago safe.

“There’s no way I’m ever going to sit up and tell you that it’s never going to be necessary to use overtime,” Snelling said. “We’re a police department, things happen. We have to make sure if we’re using it, that we’re using it in the most careful manner, the most responsible manner, and in order to do that, we have to have measures in place.”

Snelling said his command staff would continue to use data-tracking tools to monitor overtime spending and hold commanders accountable for spending.

In a separate hearing, Budget Director Annette Guzman told alderpeople a new timekeeping system for officers will allow managers to better control overtime spending. Until April 2019, CPD tracked their hours worked with a paper-based recordkeeping system requiring staff members to make manual calculations and enter data into two separate software systems.

CPD officers have worked more than 3.5 million hours overtime so far this year for dozens of reasons, according to the inspector general’s database.

City Council members have repeatedly demanded that officials do a better job of requiring the organizers of special events, like the street festivals that pop up in nearly every Chicago neighborhood, to reimburse the city for the cost of officers working overtime to protect those events.

Guzman has said new controls will go into effect in 2026 to reduce that burden on taxpayers.

So far this year, officers were paid $9.8 million to work overtime during Mexican Independence Day events in mid-September. This year’s celebrations occurred just as federal officials ramped up aggressive raids designed to carry out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation order.

By comparison, officers were paid $8.2 million to work overtime through the end of October to testify during court proceedings about the evidence they developed against those charged with a crime and to meet with attorneys to prepare for those sessions, according to data published by the inspector general.

An additional $8.1 million went to officers who were assigned to get the approval of an assistant state’s attorney before filing felony charges so far this year, according to data published by the inspector general.

Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke announced Nov. 21 that Chicago police officers are now allowed to charge those arrested with unlawful possession of a weapon, unlawful possession of a weapon by a felon and aggravated unlawful possession of a weapon without waiting for the approval of an assistant state’s attorney.

In all, officers earned a total of $5.7 million through the end of October to patrol what CPD lists as “planned gathering/march/civil unrest,” according to data published by the inspector general.

Despite widespread protests of Trump and his policies, as well as the war in Gaza, only 2.6% of the city’s police overtime spending went to keeping those exercising their First Amendment rights safe, according to data published by the inspector general.

By comparison, officers were paid $4.7 million in overtime to police the Puerto Rican Independence Day festival and $2 million to work overtime after the Pride Parade in June, according to 2025 data published by the inspector general.

In 2024, CPD spent a total of $273.8 million on overtime, 6.5% less than in 2023, according to a WTTW News analysis.

Johnson’s proposed 2026 spending plan would require CPD brass to submit monthly reports about its overtime spending to the City Council, and require the City Council to hold hearings every three months “to ensure transparency and accountability.”

If CPD exhausts its budget for overtime, as it did this year by June, it will have to ask the City Council to appropriate more funds, officials said.

“We’re keeping much better records of overtime,” Snelling said. “We use it judiciously.”

Through the end of October, CPD spent $23 million less on police overtime this year than it did during the first 10 months of 2024, according to the inspector general’s database.

Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]

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