The Metropolitan Police Department Budget for Fiscal Year 1981 requests a
total appropriation of $111,055,600 and a gross obligational authority of
$113,542,500. With these amounts it proposes to fund a manpower authorization
of 4,612 positions and to maintain an average strength of 4,474 positions.
This average will be composed of 3,880 sworn personnel and 594 civilian em-
ployees. After accepting the attrition required by this budget during the
fiscal year, the Department will be left at the end of the year with a
strength of 3,794 sworn members. Civilian manpower will be reduced by 30
positions due to centralization of the District's personnel functions.

The Metropolitan Police Department Budget for Fiscal Year 1981 differs from
previous budgets in that it contains no request for pension funding. The
base amount available for the purpose has been removed from this request and
used to establish Police Pensions as a separate budgetary entity. Comparison
of this request with those of previous years can therefore, be made only by
adjusting the totals by removal of pension amounts. The planned appropriated
obligational authority for Fiscal Year 1980 thus becomes $112,751,900. This
is $1,696,300 more than the amount being requested for Fiscal Year 1981.
This budget projects another year of fiscal austerity for the Metropolitan
Police Department. The 1.5% reduction in the operating budget combined with
anticipated double digit inflation will impose severe overall restraints on
the Department's expenditures.

In spite of these restraints, the Department does not propose the termination
of any of its programs. The sum of $442,100 is redirected from overtime to
other operating expenses. The funds are demanded by the recent dramatic
price increases particularly for gasoline and medical services. To compensate
for this redirection, a new court appearance monitoring program has been
established. The unit has demonstrated its ability to reduce requirements
for court overtime by strict enforcement of minimum legal requirements in
this area.
Emergency measures are being studied to enable the Department to
reduce consumption of gasoline. The size of the vehicle fleet has already
been reduced, and only compact-size cars will be purchased in the future.
All supervisory personnel have been warned that they will be held responsible
for any waste of Departmental resources by the units under their command.

These and other measures which will be initiated as opportunities arise

should enable the Department to hold the line against inflation for at least another year.

There is some indication that the recent increase in crime which has caused
the Department much concern, may have been reversed. Crime decreased signi-
ficantly in both July and August, and the statistics for the first half of
September are also lower than those for the prior year.

To balance these optimistic indications, there is evidence to indicate a
substantial increase in narcotics activity in recent months. This is
particularly true of heroin usage, which has in the past been associated with
an increase in Crime Index Offenses, particularly with burglary.

Taken together, these factors indicate that the prevention of a further
increase in criminal activity will require a strenuous and carefully super-
vised application of all resources available to the Department.

Those measurable workload factors, other than criminal offenses, on which
statistics are maintained show a steady increase. Emergency calls for
service are expected to increase by 4.5% to a total of approximately 1,114,720
This provides a fairly accurate indication of the increase in police service
that will be requested by the citizens.

With scrupulous attention to details and these program improvements control over crime can be maintained in spite of the decrease in total resources available and a satisfactory level of service will be maintained.