Police layoffs in 2009 illustrate value of permanent Public Safety Tax

Larsen said he now derives comfort from knowing that 160 officers are funded by a stable fund via a tax dedicated solely to public safety.

The Public Safety Tax was designed to help bolster the ranks of Tulsa’s police officers by 160 and firefighters by 65, along with helping address equipment needs. Leaders at TPD and Tulsa Fire Department feel the tax — reserved solely for public safety, as approved by voters in 2016 — allows them to better navigate instability of sales tax collections for the general fund.

“And it showed the faith of the citizens,” Larsen added.

The tax now generates more than $20 million per year, reaching $24.5 million in fiscal year 2023. The fund’s end-of-year balance has grown from $3.2 million to $13.8 million, which officials describe as an intentional cushion left available for unexpected or rising costs.

The Public Safety Tax ballot question overwhelmingly passed with 72% of the vote in April 2016 as its own part of the Vision Tulsa proposals. The final public safety plan had settled on an additional 160 officers and 65 firefighters after a University of Cincinnati study on police staffing.

Then-Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett, who helped orchestrate the final Public Safety Tax proposal, recalled how the Great Recession hammered the city’s finances to land him in a horrible position in 2009.

Bartlett said he approached the police and fire unions to ask for temporary pay cuts — because the city wasn’t going to file for bankruptcy — or they would have to endure layoffs.

“The Fire Department (union), to their credit, they voted to take the cuts. They understood how drastic the situation was,” Bartlett said. “The Police Department (union) thought I was bluffing, and so they just said, ‘Well, no, we’re not going to do that.’ And so the next day, I had to lay a whole bunch of them off. It was not fun.”

Jeff Downs, current president of the Tulsa Fraternal Order of Police, said union leadership at the time gave Bartlett a counter offer for officers to receive future compensatory time off instead of overtime pay. The FOP projected it would save more money than what the 5% wage cuts would do.

Bartlett said the city eventually regained its financial footing and was able restore the salary cuts and rehire all of the officers except one — who left Tulsa — to their original positions.

In any event, Bartlett and Downs both agree the Public Safety Tax was an important development to help somewhat insulate police and fire from such problems in the future.

Downs said his concern is making sure the city doesn’t at some point decide to reallocate public safety funds elsewhere while the police department works to build up its number of officers. He said doing so could create funding issues downstream after more officers come on board.

“I don’t want them to say, ‘Oh, there’s, you know, $13 million sitting over here. Let’s take half of that and go (for example) start our own EMSA service. Or let’s give this money to some other purpose,’” Downs said. “That’s what I don’t want to happen.”

Tulsa Fire Chief Michael Baker said his largest concern is future stability of the fund, which he feels has been achieved so far in spite of uncertainty injected a few years ago by COVID-19.

“I’ve seen some timeline projections from probably around 2020, when we’re just starting to get into the pandemic,” Baker said. “There were some concerns that we were draining faster than we were putting in. So it is nice to have a little bit of a healthy balance there.”

The fund’s ending balance of $11 million in fiscal year 2019 dipped to $8.6 million by fiscal year 2021, according to city budget documents. The ending balance then increased the next two years up to $13.8 million in fiscal year 2023.

Baker said having a healthy balance allows for flexibility and a safety net. If a special need or project arises, he said he can request to access the fund.

Ultimately, his goal is to keep the fund as stable as possible to guard against a potential “roller coaster general fund” experience.

“There’s going to be some natural expansion of the need,” Baker said. “But I think having some good periods of time where we’ve been able to add to the fund balance — if we can keep that up, then we are able to continue the great work that both police and fire can do out of that.”