Hackensack asks NJ attorney general to weigh in on cops paid twice for same time worked

HACKENSACK — After an audit, the city is asking the state attorney general to weigh in on whether it is legal for police officers to be paid twice for the same time worked.

The resolution asking for Attorney General Matthew Platkin’s formal opinion on the practice, adopted by the council last Tuesday night, is the latest development in ongoing tensions between Hackensack police officers and leaders of the city and the Police Department.

A 2022 review of the department revealed widespread overtime abuse by ranking officers and a drop in arrests. A second audit similarly revealed overtime and extra-duty detail abuses by some of the highest-ranking and highest-paid officers.

Among the "troubling practices" the reports noted were splitting shifts, changing schedules to maximize the number of extra-duty details worked and "double-dipping" by overlapping shifts so officers were paid for working extra-duty details, such as traffic control at construction sites, and working their regular assignments at the same time.

Using those methods, some officers would make $30,000 to over $50,000 in extra-duty pay in a year, padding their total pay to more than $260,000, city officials said.

The audit was previously sent to the attorney general and the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office, but the city has not received a response.

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“Taxpayers rely on police superior officers to set an example and provide effective leadership, but instead a handful of bad actors placed their own financial gain ahead of their sworn duties to the residents they serve,” Mayor John Labrosse said in a statement. “This may well be happening in other law enforcement agencies across the state, and we hope the attorney general will make a declarative ruling that this practice was improper and never should have happened in Hackensack.”

Police Director Ray Guidetti was hired in August 2022 after the review of the department recommended that the city hire an outside director rather than appoint a police chief from within.

He quickly began reforming the department, including addressing the overtime concerns raised in the report by using an outside system called Jobs4Blue to manage extra-duty details.

Since Guidetti’s hiring, five lawsuits and numerous grievances have been filed by Hackensack officers against the city and the director.

Both Policemen's Benevolent Association Local 9, the union representing the city's rank-and-file officers, and PBA Local 9A, the supervisors' union, recently voted to express no confidence in Guidetti and Capt. Michael Antista.

Shortly after the vote by PBA Local 9 in December, city officials announced they were extending Guidetti's contract by another year, to run through 2026.

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City officials say the pushback and lawsuits are part of an effort to return to a “broken system” that was lucrative for some officers but damaging to the department.

“The city has made it clear based upon the findings of what we believe is a highly credible audit that this practice was detrimental to the city’s law enforcement efforts,” City Attorney Steve Kleinman said. “There appears to be a desire by some in the department to go back to practices that we feel were at a minimum horribly inappropriate. And we want the attorney general to make clear that’s unacceptable.”

At a council meeting last month, the rising tension between the sides was on display as Guidetti, Antista and several officers gave vastly different accounts of the state of the department and their views of its direction.

Officers described plummeting morale and a lack of communication with department and city leadership.

At one point during the meeting, Labrosse referred to the officers as "the enemy" when they filed out of the meeting while Deputy Mayor Kathy Canestrino talked about the accomplishments made under Guidetti's leadership.

Union leaders have called the audits misleading and one-sided. An investigation by the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office into the allegations last year exonerated five supervisors, they said.

“The Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office conducted a thorough investigation and found no wrongdoing whatsoever,” said Anthony DiPersia, the president of Local 9A. “The results of that investigation speak for itself.”

But Kleinman said the outcome of that investigation should not be taken as an indication that the overtime and extra-duty practices were acceptable.

“Just because something was not pursued from an internal affairs standpoint doesn’t mean that it is OK,” he said. “It’s not just necessarily what is legal but what is right, and only the attorney general can make that definitive determination. And that’s what we’re asking he do.”

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Hackensack police pay issue may go to NJ attorney general for review