Without new property taxes, New Orleans' public safety agencies could cut funding for traffic accident response, emergency management personnel, and body-worn officer cameras, as Mayor Helena Moreno's administration seeks to close a $77 million budget gap.

The proposals shared during the second day of presentations to the City Council about the city’s 2027 budget outlined details on a number of the more than 75 cuts that Moreno presented last week to the council.

Public safety leaders said that the cuts would strain staff and pose new challenges for emergency response, even as they committed to keeping service as speedy as possible. City officials say that the largest cuts would be necessary if the council fails to “roll forward” property taxes, though some cuts are likely under any scenario. A full roll forward could generate up to $42 million.

The council is expected to adopt a final budget by Dec. 1, and council members will hear from additional city department leaders about their needs in the coming weeks.

The proposed elimination of a $1.3 million NOPD contract with a private company that responds to minor traffic accidents particularly sparked officials’ concerns. The company, On Scene Services, has sped up response times to traffic accidents since it was contracted in 2018, leaders said.

“It would be a tremendous self-own, self-goal, horrible position to be in… if we saw call time creep back up to those terrifying levels in 2022 and 2023, where people were having to wait two, three hours for response,” said Council President JP Morrell. “I do think it’s going to have to be a cooperative conversation how we address the issue.”

NOPD Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick said that if the contract were cut, traffic accidents would enter “the queue as any other 911 calls” and police officers would respond.

The department would “do everything to maintain efficient services,” she said.

The department also plans to cut $2.5 million in spending on body-worn cameras, cameras in police vehicles and tasers.

“We would take a surgical approach of who really needs to have a body camera,” said Kirkpatrick. “Not all of our officers have citizen contacts.”

NOPD cuts

The proposal would cut 62 full time civilian employees from NOPD “all across the board, in every division of our department,” said Kirkpatrick. Those duties would be filled by sworn officers, she said.

The city would shave a total of $3 million from the city’s general fund for NOPD compared with actual spending in 2026, a 2% decrease. But the proposed $167 million budget is a $5 million increase from the department’s proposed 2026 budget. That increase reflects additional funding for NOPD to conduct parking enforcement duties, which it took over from the Department of Public Works earlier this year.

Moreno’s team has said some cuts could be mitigated by the roll forward, which is when the city rolls forward millage rates to the maximum allowed by law. The mayor wants the City Council to help decide how much to increase the millages and which programs the city should cut. Some City Council members have called for the mayor to have more of a hand in that decision, which is controversial.

Criminal justice advocates noted on Wednesday that the NOPD, if the current budget stands, would take a smaller hit than some other departments. The New Orleans Fire Department would see a 10% cut because of unbudgeted terminal leave payouts and fire pension payments this year. The $5 million budget for the city’s low barrier homeless shelter would be zeroed out under Moreno’s proposed budget.

“The things that are in place to prevent violence are being cut much more heavily than the police budget,” said Sara Omojola, director of the Vera Institute of Justice, a criminal justice nonprofit. Omojola also raised concern about decreasing the number of body-worn cameras for officers.

The council will vote Thursday on whether to extend a $1.2 million a year contract with Ubuntu Village, a community violence prevention nonprofit.

Other public safety cuts

The city’s fire and emergency management departments, and juvenile jail, would all face significant cuts, too.

The Office of Coordination and Emergency Management proposed eliminating several key personnel to shrink its budget by 17% from 2026.

Those include people responsible for coordinating emergency response and preparedness for storms and heat advisories, including one person dedicated to serving people with limited mobility.

“Everybody has to wear different hats, so that’s what we’d continue to do,” said Director Darrick Hesson.

The Juvenile Justice Intervention Center, the city’s juvenile jail, also proposed cuts that would shrink its budget by 14%, cutting $300,000 from programming within its facilities and $430,000 for medical care for incarcerated youth. Several incarcerated young people who spoke on via teleconference at a City Council committee meeting Monday said the jail has given them a break from violence and poverty at home.

The New Orleans Fire Department proposed slashing the city's contribution to its pension system for this year by $8.5 million. The New Orleans Firefighters’ Pension and Relief Fund has been called by pension experts one of the worst in the U.S. for being chronically underfunded by the city.

The Orleans Parish Coroner’s Office would see a budget cut of 6%, about $219,000. A spokesperson said the cut is significant “when we are already struggling to pay dynamic bills like toxicology, body bags, and specialized equipment like PPE, that have doubled in price.”

Traffic response

Ethan Cheramie, founder of On Site Services, defended his company’s work in an interview Wednesday.

“Every call we handle gives NOPD about two hours of officer time back for higher priority calls and enforcement. … And we are doing it at a competitive price point for the city.”

Cheramie said he would be open to decreasing the company’s rates, after Morrell suggested that NOPD explore re-bidding the contract to seek the services at a lower cost. He said uncertainty about the program’s future has already led him to furlough about half his agents.

His firm is also still owed $1.3 million from the city for its work from the period spanning Sept. 1, 2025 through Aug. 31, 2026, due to a slow, clunky contracting and city ratification process, he said.

Staff writers Missy Wilkinson, Joni Hess, and Marco Cartolano contributed to this report.

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