City OT just doesn’t pass the smell test

Something seems off when the mayor of New Mexico’s largest city isn’t one of the top 10 wage earners in city government. In fact, Mayor Tim Keller’s $132,500 salary actually appears meager, considering it barely cracks the top 250 city wage earners.

What’s even odder is police and fire personnel not only account for the overwhelming majority of the city’s highest paid employees, thanks primarily to overtime, but many are more than doubling their base pay.

Albuquerque Fire Rescue battalion chief Clinton Anderson earned a city-leading $235,993 last year, more than twice his base salary. Albuquerque Police Department Lt. Justin Hunt made $217,646 last year, more than the $204,023 salary paid to Chief Harold Medina. APD had 143 of the city’s top 250 wage earners last year, while AFR had 51.

AFR paramedic Lt. Tom Ruiz, who made $191,487 last year, says the volume of overtime is a result of fire department leaders filling in for colleagues out sick, on vacation, in training or on family leave. AFR lieutenants, Ruiz says, can fill a wide range of roles because of their rank and licensure. The result — four AFR paramedic lieutenants and a paramedic driver were among the city’s top 10 wage earners last year.

And yet, Ruiz says AFR is fully staffed. If true, why is there so much OT? Do these AFR managers create the work schedules, and if so are they cherry-picking OT shifts?

APD, on the other hand, has been understaffed for years, with just 865 sworn officers, well short of the 1,100 budgeted. While that makes APD’s OT more understandable, abuse has plagued the police department and prompted audits. APD had three of the city’s top 10 paid employees last year, while AFR had six.

It is time, again, for the City Council, the city auditor, the city Office of the Inspector General and/or the state auditor to take a look at APD and AFR’s overtime. While we all should appreciate our first responders — we turn to them in our worst moments, our lives and those of our loved ones may indeed depend on them at any time — the departments’ brass need to be good stewards of public money, not allow a haven for mid-level managers to pad their paychecks.

If everything about the departments’ overtime is on the up-and-up, so be it. But without that proof, one can only imagine the demoralizing effect these paychecks have on the rest of the city’s 5,800-employee workforce.