The District’s police union says Chief Cathy Lanier’s real reason for calling a state of emergency three days before the 10th anniversary of 9/11 was to save on overtime costs. The union has filed a grievance asking for overtime pay for their entire 12-hour shifts over eight days and penalty pay for violating the labor contract, an amount union President Kristopher Baumann said could total more than $8 million.
The grievance, filed Friday evening, says Lanier violated the union contract when she suspended it on Sept. 8 for a state of emergency and immediately placed officers on 12-hour shifts. The rotating, 12-hour shifts were extended again after the 9/11 anniversary and ended on Sept. 17.
No reason was initially given for the state of emergency, despite inquiries by the police union, the grievance said. Several hours after being notified of the contract suspension, Assistant Chief Alfred Durham told the union that “preparing for the tenth anniversary of 9/11” was the reason for the emergency, the grievance said.
According to the collective bargaining agreement, the contract can only be suspended in very few, extreme examples, including a state of emergency.
Lanier also told The Washington Examiner on Sept. 8 that she ordered the schedule change at the last minute as a way to keep her officers on alert and help thwart any possible attacks. Lanier said at the time that officers had been preparing for weeks and there were no specific threats.
“This is just part of our plan,” she said at the time.
Baumann said last week that the union believes officers were not immediately given a reason for their contract suspension because there was no state of emergency at the time, noting Lanier’s initial response to the media.
“They didn’t need to suspend it,” he said. “They wouldn’t even articulate the reason.”
However sources involved in the discussions with the FBI on Sept. 8 said the city’s top officials were told to keep a lid on a potential terror threat to either Washington or New York until the morning of Sept. 9 and that caused all the secrecy. However, the report ended up leaking to news media that evening.
“I guess they think the FBI is lying,” Lanier told The Washington Examiner in an email Friday, referring to the union.
Officers were paid for four hours overtime on their multiple 12-hour shifts during the state of emergency. The union’s compensation requests would more than double officers’ take-home pay from that week.
