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Months before the end of its fiscal 2025-26 budget year, Kansas City, Missouri, Chief of Police Stacey Graves is calling for “some drastic cost-reduction measures” to solve a “budgetary imbalance.”
In a recent letter to the department, Graves said the measures are needed “to ensure our basic services can continue to be supported.”
The department’s 2025-26 appropriated budget was $343 million, a 7.64% increase from its 2024-25 budget of $319 million. The amount of the department’s budgetary imbalance wasn’t immediately provided.
“Effective immediately, all overtime not critical to basic operations is suspended,” Graves wrote in the letter, saying that any necessary overtime, on-call or extenuating circumstances require prior manager approval. “I understand the nature of our jobs do not always allow for these kinds of drastic reductions and there may be some temporary adjustments to schedules and services to ensure we continue to provide a high-level of public safety service.”
Graves also called for a pause in hiring for professional staff positions, with any exceptions requiring her approval. The pause will be re-evaluated after May 1, when the new budget year begins.
Other changes include a pause of all “non-critical supplies and equipment purchases.”
“There are multiple factors which lead to this budgetary imbalance, and it will take sacrifices by all of us to remedy it,” Graves said. “We will get through these next few months as a unified police department, and continue investing in the future.”
This is a developing story and may be updated.
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