The Sacramento Police Department is proposing service cuts to help the city close its massive budget gap that could lead to longer waits for 911 calls to be answered, delays in some violent crime investigations and a decrease in proactive enforcement against drugs and gangs.

The cuts, laid out in a memo Police Chief Rick Braziel sent to City Manager Ray Kerridge on Tuesday, will help the department come up with the final $3.6 million it needs to reach the 8 percent reduction ordered for its budget.

Faced with a city budget shortfall of $58 million, officials cut the department's budget by $16 million this year. The department has lost dozens of positions since last year and is experimenting with doubling up officers in patrol cars to save on fuel and maintenance costs.

The latest cuts – some of which already are being implemented – would slash more than 1,300 hours of overtime a month and change how police prioritize their response to certain crimes. It could mean delays in investigating robberies and sex assaults and less patrolling by officers now under pressure to write reports before their shifts end.

"All of these action items will negatively impact customer service to the community and the working conditions of our employees," Braziel writes in the memo obtained by The Bee.

In an interview Tuesday night, Braziel said the city's budget crisis is forcing the department to focus narrowly on violent crimes. He acknowledged he is not sure how the cuts will affect the crime rate.

"And that's the one thing we talked about that we're going to have to track," Braziel said. "Every week we're going to analyze crime. … How did we respond to it, and how do we make it better?"

Kerridge said planned reductions in the Police Department budget – including the number of officers taking voluntary separation packages – fell short of projections, forcing the additional cuts.

The department also has been faced with unplanned expenses, such as investigating an increase in homicides, Braziel said. A recent case cost the department $25,000 in overtime.

Kerridge and Braziel will meet Thursday to discuss the proposal and will likely present their findings to the City Council next week.

"It might well be that when we go through with this, this is the way we're going to go," Kerridge said. "But I can't tell you with my hand on my heart that these are the only options."

Kerridge said his office would need City Council approval to take the $3.6 million from other city agencies to offset the police shortfall.

Tuesday night, Mayor Heather Fargo said she and the rest of the council will "want to weigh in on these cuts."

"Public safety is the top priority of the city, of myself and the council, and we will do our best to keep the city of Sacramento as safe as possible," she said.

In the end, the decision lies with the city manager and Police Department, Kerridge said. Should the cuts go through, Braziel pledged to keep the city and the public apprised of their impact – "the good, the bad and the ugly."

Brent Meyer, president of the Sacramento Police Officers Association, said he expects the consequences to be serious. "Unfortunately, I think this is a sign of the times of what's to come on our Police Department budget," he said.

"There's no money and the chief's got to do everything he can to ensure that public safety is met," Meyer said, "but it's certainly not going to be the acceptable level for him," the union or residents.

"The citizens of Sacramento deserve more," he said.

Officials targeted the department's budget for part-time employees, public counters at police stations and overtime because it had not been adjusted in recent years to reflect actual expenses, the memo says.

Overtime could be virtually eliminated for emergency dispatchers and patrol officers. Detectives handling crimes other than homicides and critical incidents that could turn fatal – such as a hostage situation – would no longer be called out when off-duty.

Braziel said there could be extenuating circumstances and that captains will have discretion to call out detectives.

He also said that patrol sergeants might grant overtime in cases in which officers must finish priority reports before leaving for their days off or when they must transport a suspect to jail at the end of their shift. But those cases will be limited.

Eliminating overtime is a dramatic shift from current practice, in which officers often delay report writing to respond to calls. The effect, Meyer said, will be that officers spend less time patrolling the streets.

"You're not going to write the reports on your own time, so basically (sergeants) are going to ground you," he said.

The impact will be even more severe because of a recent mandate that all patrol officers ride two to a car – a cost-cutting experiment that will be evaluated at the end of the month.

"If you've got one officer sitting there finishing a report, you've got two officers sitting there finishing a report, right?" Meyer said.

He said he does not fault the chief for working within the budget mandated by the city – but said the cuts are painful nonetheless. "We've cut through all the fat," he said. "We're down to the muscle."

Mayoral candidate Kevin Johnson called the cuts "inexcusable" and said the Police Department's budget woes are a sign that Fargo's priorities are skewed.

"I would not have cut public safety, I would have done everything to prevent that," he said.

Braziel said the cuts come as a blow to a department already struggling with low morale. He estimated that individual employees are facing pay reductions of 10 percent to 40 percent because of overtime changes.

"We're really starting to feel it," he said.

Put bluntly, the chief said, "This has not been fun."

Call The Bee's Ryan Lillis, (916) 321-1085.