Chicago City Wire

Democratic candidate for mayor Paul Vallas has accused current Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and CPD Superintendent David Brown of lying about police officers' scheduling after a new report found that more than 1,100 officers had to work at least 11 consecutive days during April and May of this year.

"Shameful! An investigation of CPD scheduling published by @ChicagoOIG makes clear Lightfoot & Brown lied repeatedly to the public while forcing Police Officers to work weeks without rest, leaving them overstressed & demoralized. Punishing their families. Real leaders don’t lie," Vallas tweeted on Aug. 29.

The City of Chicago Office of Inspector General conducted an investigation into the scheduling of Chicago Police Officers and released a report in response to public concern surrounding scheduling practices and canceled days off. The report found that more than 1,000 CPD officers were scheduled to work at least 11 consecutive days between April 1 and May 31 of this year.

Lightfoot denied allegations in June that CPD officers' days off were being canceled, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. 

Inspector General Deborah Witzburg sees a safety risk in the scheduling.

“The concern is that we are putting both members of the public and members of the department at risk. Police officers on the street who have gone a long time with no rest are not equipped to make their best decisions. And they, themselves, are at risk. Their safety and morale is at risk,” Witzburg said, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. “There are lots of industries that have restrictions on the number of days and the number of consecutive hours that somebody can work. Truck drivers and airline pilots and medical residents. There needs to be a decision made at CPD about how much is too much. There also needs to be a reckoning about how we store this information so that the department is well-positioned to make thoughtful, well-informed management decisions about how it staffs the police department.” Witzburg noted that the police department's poor record-keeping practices hampered her investigation.

On average, CPD districts have lost 24% of their staff under Brown's leadership, CWB Chicago reported.