Dear Mr. Speaker and Representative Jeffries,
I am writing on behalf of the members of the National Fraternal Order of Police employed by the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) to urge you and your House colleagues to take up and pass S. 1077, the “District of Columbia Local Funds Act,” which the Senate passed on 14 March by unanimous consent. This bill is critical to preserving the ability of MPD to protect the residents and visitors to the District of Columbia.
This legislation is also supported by President Trump and his Office of Management and Budget. The District of Columbia raises the vast majority of its own revenues and there is no cost to the Federal government. The legislation would restore the District of Columbia’s ability to implement its Fiscal Year 2025 budget—which Congress approved in the September 2024 continuing resolution (P.L. 118-83) and re-affirmed it in the December continuing resolution (P.L. 118-158). Congress has long recognized the District of Columbia’s ability to implement its Congressionally approved budget. The change effected by the most recent continuing resolution, H.R. 1698, deviated from this decades-long precedent and, in some media reports, has been described as a “drafting error.”
The impact of the most recent continuing resolution would require the District of Columbia to implement steep cuts in the middle of this fiscal year, effectively compounding the impact of these drastic reductions in ways that may harm public safety operations. The District of Columbia believes the only way that it can reduce spending in this period of time would be through layoffs, furloughs, and hiring freezes of its employees city-wide. According to the FOP’s MPD Labor Committee, the MPD is currently short-staffed by approximately 1,000 officers, so there is already a strain on law enforcement resources in the District. Cost-cutting measures under consideration include reducing overtime deployments and suspending recruitment and retention efforts, which would lead to increased response times to calls for service and, in some cases, no response at all.
We urge the House to preserve the District of Columbia’s Congressionally-approved budget by passing S. 1077. If the House fails to act, the public safety impact on the District of Columbia would be quite severe.
On behalf of the more than 377,000 members of the Fraternal Order of Police, I urge the House to consider and pass S. 1077 as quickly as possible to ensure that visitors and residents of the District of Columbia are kept safe. If I can provide any additional information about this issue, please do not hesitate to contact me or Executive Director Jim Pasco in our Washington, D.C. office.
Sincerely,
Patrick Yoes
National President