BALTIMORE (WBFF) — Police leaders pointed to a sharp drop in killings and fielded questions about smoke shops, overtime and staffing during a Baltimore Police Department budget hearing Tuesday.
Police Commissioner Richard Worley opened the hearing by highlighting what he described as a historic decline in homicides.
“Homicides are down another 24%,” Worley said.
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He also noted that May ended with eight homicides, the first single-digit May homicide total recorded in more than 50 years.
City Councilman Isaac “Yitzy” Schleifer, who represents District 5, credited Worley for the reduction.
“We see a lot of people taking a lot of credit for the crime reduction. But I just want to set the record straight here…nobody deserves more credit than you do for the crime reduction,” Schleifer said.
After the accolades, council members pressed Worley on public safety concerns, including smoke shops across the city. Council President Zeke Cohen called them a public safety hazard and raised concerns about “under-regulated products and deceptive practices,” during his questioning.
Cohen said he and Councilman Antonio Glover, who represents District 13, recently introduced legislation aimed at repeat offenders.
“Councilman Glover and I introduced a bill recently to enable law enforcement to padlock repeat bad actors. Will you support that legislation?” Cohen asked.
Worley said he would support it.
Cohen also asked how much police resources are being used to address the issue. Worley said enforcement is handled through existing district operations rather than a dedicated unit.
“There’s no set unit that does it. We have our districts, our district active teams do it,” Worley said.
He added that investigations often require coordination with other agencies.
“Once we get the complaint we have to work with all our partners, federal, state and local (because) lots of times, (those shops) are in violation of their licenses,” Worley said.
The department is asking City Council to direct $656 million to BPD, which would be the largest police budget in more than a decade. Rising overtime costs continue to take up a significant portion of the department’s budget, with staffing shortages cited as a major driver.
City Councilman Zac Blanchard, of District 11, questioned whether the city is adequately funding projected overtime costs.
“What are we projecting and do we feel that we’re adequately funding that budget?” Blanchard asked.
Worley responded, “Moneywise, we’re going over our budget.”
Worley said the department has just over 2,000 officers and more than 400 vacancies. He said he hopes to add 150 officers by the end of the year.
During the hearing, Worley also acknowledged the staffing issue could have been handled better last year, saying he did not meet his goal of building up patrol staffing.
“Building up patrols was my lofty goal. I didn’t do as good as a job as I should’ve done with that for the couple of years…because I’ve been concentrating on getting our violence down and I didn’t put as many people in patrol as I should,” Worley said.
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