Property taxes ($202.6 million annually) and city sales taxes ($143.8 million annually) comprise the lion’s share of the City of Fresno’s revenue. Perhaps taxpayers should be more concerned about how these taxes are allocated. For example, $704,000 a day or $29,388 per hour or $488 per minute of your tax dollars will go to the Fresno Police Department (FPD) in the coming fiscal year to, many say, over-police the community.
One example is the over-policing of unhoused community members. Since the implementation of the harsh no camping ordinance in September 2024, more than 400 people have been arrested and many more have been cited, at great expense to taxpayers.
Booking costs alone could exceed $80,000 for the 400 arrests, and future court costs will be high. Policing and criminalizing our unhoused community members is expensive, cruel and actually increases homelessness.
Another example is the over-policing of Black and Brown communities. Catalyst California, a racial justice advocacy organization, released a report in July 2024 that found “Fresno officers stop people, especially men of color, with disproportionate frequency compared to white people, and that officers spend most of their time on traffic enforcement that does not make the community safer.”
The FPD has been criticized for making more traffic stops in southwest Fresno than in any other part of the city. Some critics suggest that there could be implicit biases influencing the department’s policing practices.
How effective is the FPD? On homicide clearance rates, the department did well in 2023, claiming a 100% clearance rate. (A clearance rate is the share of reported crimes for which police make an arrest and refer the case to prosecution.)
However, clearance rates are low in most other categories, such as property crimes. In September 2024, the Public Policy Institute of California released a report on crime clearance rates in California. The report found that “Fresno’s cleared larceny rate had risen to 19% before the pandemic only to plunge to 7% in 2022.” There is no specific data on Fresno larceny clearance rates for 2024.
Clearance rates are low in most categories throughout police departments in the United States, and there is no direct correlation between increased police budgeting and higher clearance rates. For instance, clearance rates for auto thefts in California were only 10% in 2022 and remain low in Fresno. Burglary clearance rates hover at around 13% in Fresno.
Mayor Jerry Dyer’s proposed FPD budget for fiscal 2026 is the largest General Fund allocation, about $257 million, or 50.1% of the 2026 General Fund, increasing the police budget by nearly $5.7 million. Currently, the FPD is budgeted for 926 police officer positions and 400 civilian positions, although some sworn officer positions remain unfilled.
Four new police officer positions are proposed, bringing the total to 930 sworn officers, although, in addition, 30 new police cars are planned to be leased. The budget also includes the purchase of a 20-year-old police helicopter.
The FPD’s budget for fiscal 2026 is included in the City’s overall budget proposal of $2.36 billion. The budget includes measures to absorb the end of pandemic-related funding, anticipates a deficit of $20.6 million and aims to maintain a 6% personnel vacancy rate.
The budget shortfall was driven by rising costs due to inflation-related contractual obligations and the loss of one-time funding. The City is also exploring a general or public safety tax to sustain police and fire expansions, as reported by City Council Member Miguel Arias at a recent Council meeting.
While Fresno is spending more than 50% of its annual General Fund budget on policing, data compiled by ACRE/Costofpolice.org indicate that other cities spend far less, for example, Los Angeles 23%, San Diego 34%, Chicago 35%, Memphis 40% and Oakland 43%.
The City is asking all other departments except the City Council and the Fire Department to cut their budgets through attrition, maintaining a 6.18% vacancy rate, saving about $25.4 million. In addition, every department was asked to trim 5% in non-personnel spending, saving about $11.5 million.
Many Fresnans are questioning the need to increase the police budget and are seeking accountability. Concerns include the over-policing of the Fresno community and the cuts to other City departments even as the FPD budget is increased. How will City leaders address these concerns?
Fresno is going above and beyond to over police our community. There’s already too many over zealous cops who use their badges as a way to intimidate and harrass people of this town. Trust me it’s not isolated to people of color they harrass and bother all people. As long as you fit their profile – then your screwed.
And yes the unhoused community are at a very unfair disadvantage when it comes to the cops. Like they don’t have a hard enough time as it is. Use that money and build some shelters or permenant housing for them. Solve the problem stop making more problems.