New Orleans Police Cut Overtime Costs 45% Amid Fraud Concerns

New Orleans police reduced overtime costs by nearly half after adopting biometric time clocks and other accountability measures, cutting spending from nearly $18 million to $9.6 million year over year.

By Missy Wilkinson

Source The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate

July 22, 2026

2 min read

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The New Orleans Police Department cut overtime spending by 45% in the first half of 2026, reducing costs from nearly $18 million during the same period in 2025 to $9.6 million.
The reduction followed an inspector general warning that weak overtime oversight and timekeeping practices created opportunities for fraud and contributed to the city's budget problems.
NOPD implemented biometric time clocks, account resets, spot checks and other safeguards while also furloughing 17% of its civilian workforce as the department works to address budget concerns amid declining violent crime.

Six months after the city's Office of the Inspector General warned that lax overtime management at the New Orleans Police Department created an environment ripe for fraud, the department has cut overtime costs by 45% after implementing new safeguards, the OIG said Thursday.

In the first half of 2025, NOPD's overtime costs, as reported on the city's BRASS program, totaled nearly $18 million. In the first half of 2026, those costs had dropped to $9.6 million — an $8.3 million reduction.

“The OIG applauds the NOPD and City administrators for improving the Department’s timekeeping and overtime practices to ensure that resources dedicated to public safety are used as efficiently and effectively as possible," IG Ed Michel said in a Thursday statement.

With a staff of around 900 commissioned officers — several hundred fewer than Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick says the department needs — the NOPD relies on overtime to cover essential public safety operations.

But overtime costs went unbudgeted in 2025 after the previous administration failed to include an overtime line item for the department in the city's budget. The NOPD also failed to submit required overtime budget reports to City Hall.

After NOPD overtime costs became a major contributor to the city's 2025 budget shortfall, the OIG in a January letter pinpointed multiple problematic, recurring payroll practices, which included a lack of oversight by supervisors.

In response, the NOPD has implemented biometric time clocks, reset timekeeping accounts, conducted spot checks and taken corrective action when officers were found out of compliance.

In addition to reducing overtime spending, the NOPD has furloughed 17% of its civilian force — about 53 employees — as part of its effort to address the budget shortfall. Those cost-cutting measures have come amid a continuing drop in violent crime and an increase in proactive policing, including traffic enforcement.

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