GILBERT, AZ — On Tuesday, Gilbert Police Chief Michael Soelberg presented to Gilbert Town Council a need for $2,317,210 in additional funding for the department for fiscal year 2024, which ends in June.
In budget data reviewed by ABC15, Gilbert PD was more than $6,674,672 over their projected $67 million expense budget in fiscal year 2023. The department increased its general fund budget to more than $77 million in fiscal year 2024, but once again have gone over budget.
The majority of the newly requested money, $1,900,000, would go to personnel - which the department says has incurred significant overtime costs due to staffing shortages and major investigations around cases of teen violence.
At a press conference last week Soelberg addressed concerns about the overtime budget.
“Obviously, as you have an influx of different cases, it does create an impact on your department, but not at the sake of another case,” Soelberg said. “We keep working all of our cases. It's not untypical for a detective to have 10 to 15 cases at any time that they're constantly working.”
Another $56,660 will be used to pay for communication services, and more than $360,000 in additional funds would go to vehicle costs.
“Everybody’s over budget, especially the federal government so why would Gilbert be any different,” said Gilbert resident Brian Kovacs. “I think training is a bigger thing they should spend more money on, more allocation to and seek outside training not just inside interdepartmental training.”
“That’s a lot of money and it’s coming from somewhere, they’re going to take money from us, increase taxes once again,” nurse Diona Davis said. “There’s no excuse for that. As a nurse, like saving lives, we don’t get that privilege to be over budget and then they’re going to pull money from here or there to help us. That really disgusts me actually.”
A unanimous decision of 6-0 approved the contingencies Tuesday night.
