CINCINNATI — The Cincinnati Police Department could be forced to scale back to “basic operations” if city leaders approve a potential 5% budget cut amid the city's projected $30 million budget deficit for the 2027 fiscal year.
The reduction — about $11 million — would leave CPD focused almost entirely on core patrol functions, with many quality‑of‑life and neighborhood issues going unaddressed, Interim Chief Adam Hennie told the Budget, Finance and Government Committee Monday.
Hennie said the department has received strong support in recent years, noting that funding has increased for five straight years. But Hennie was clear about the stakes.
“We’re going to do everything we can to meet whatever criteria you ask us to do, but I also want to make sure you’re aware of how that will affect the functions and the services we provide," Hennie said.
WATCH: CPD warns potential 5% budget cut could limit service to 'basic operations'
Goals, risks, and operational strain
In CPD’s budget presentation, Hennie outlined five top performance measures for fiscal year 2027 designed to improve public safety and community trust: reducing response times to priority calls by 30 seconds, improving case closure rates by three percent, increasing citizen satisfaction through more consistent feedback, expanding traffic enforcement to reduce crashes and maintaining the long-standing Collaborative Agreement on police reform.
“These are lofty goals … but I’m not going to come in front of this committee and just give you some basic ideas,” Hennie said. "We are a great police organization, and I want to make us even better … but I also wanted to be honest … with the 5% reduction … (about) how that will affect the functions and the services we provide the citizens.”
With nearly 90% of CPD’s operating budget dedicated to personnel, Hennie said deep reductions inevitably mean staffing changes. The department has identified approximately $6.6 million in cuts so far, largely by not filling vacant sworn positions ($3.8 million savings), making miscellaneous cuts ($250,000) and delaying the next recruit class until fiscal year 2028 ($2.6 million savings).
The remaining $4.3 million to reach the 5% target would require not filling vacant unsworn positions and making "other personnel changes," which would significantly strain patrol, investigative and support functions, Hennie said.
"Because unfortunately, that 10% of my budget, 60% of that is for Axon and Shot Spotter, so that only leaves me 40% of the 10% of the budget to be able to reduce, which would pretty much shut the police department down," Hennie said.
A reduction would also strain CPD’s vehicle fleet. Recent acquisitions have allowed more single-officer patrols, but cuts could mean fewer patrol cars on the streets, Hennie said. Additionally, CPD might not be able to maintain consistent community surveys to measure service levels and adjust resource deployment.
“It would be very difficult for us to receive (that feedback),” Hennie said, noting that citizen perception is a crucial part of public safety.
City leaders signal police priority
Committee Chair Jeff Cramerding made clear police funding is a priority — while acknowledging the pressures of balancing the overall budget.
“Public safety is a priority … that’s going to be part of our conversation moving forward. If you take away your biggest department or your biggest two departments, that means much larger cuts for the other departments," Cramerding said. "That’s just the math and the situation we’re dealing with. That doesn’t mean that we’re going to cut police, it just makes the rest of the budget that much more challenging.”
Committee member Scotty Johnson commended CPD’s work on Opening Day, handling a breakout of violence and disorder at the Banks and during a recent attempted street racing takeover, calling policing in 2026 “extremely difficult."
"Because society is sick, you're called upon to heal in circumstances that are almost impossible," Johnson said. "And I think people forget that. They forget that society is not getting any better, but we're asking you to do almost double with less."
Committee member Seth Walsh pointed to a budget monitoring report showing that CPD could need up to $13.9 million in overtime by fiscal year-end if not curtailed. He emphasized the need to address staffing shortages to prevent escalating overtime costs.
CPD currently has 959 officers. That number is 100 short of the department's budgeted 1,059 complement.
“It’s really important to talk about what you guys are doing on a shoestring budget already … policing is one of the most critical services we provide here,” Walsh said.
When asked about plans to bring in more lateral hires and accelerate recruitment, Hennie told Walsh that it's "just going to be a numbers game."
CPD had recently graduated a lateral class and is seeing quality recruits, but if the next class is pushed back due to budget cuts, the department would be faced with challenges, Hennie said.
Hennie also cautioned that requests for additional visibility or patrols from City Hall inevitably raise costs.
“You can ask for the visibility, but don’t ever think that we can keep it within the original budget that you provided us,” said Hennie.
