In a city where the median household income is around $37,000, a Schenectady police sergeant earned $174,021 last year, making him the highest paid municipal employee in 2015, according to city payroll records obtained by the Times Union under a Freedom of Information Act request.

In doing so, Sgt. Jeffrey McCutcheon supplemented his $75,537 annual base salary with $88,659 in overtime pay plus nearly $10,000 in special compensation, including pay for longevity and working holidays. Most of the other lawmen also received compensation on top of their base bay and overtime.

McCutcheon, who Wednesday celebrates eight years on the force, said most of his overtime last year occurred as a patrol officer, not as a supervisor.

“If I didn’t work, the spot wouldn’t be filled, and there would be one less person on the streets,” said McCutcheon.

He said he accepted the overtime only after it was rejected by patrol officers and detectives.

“I work a lot, I like the people I work with, and I like being involved with the city,’ said McCutcheon. “I never feel it’s a burden to come to work.”

Lt. Mark McCracken, the city police spokesman, earned $168,649, good enough for the No. 2 spot, a position he’s held for the past few years.

Three other city police officers, Peter Mullen, the Schenectady Police Benevolent Association president, Edward Ritz and Jeremy Pace also more than doubled their yearly salary by working extra hours on their way to the No. 3, 4 and 6 spots, respectively.

Everyone on the list of the top 10 moneymakers with the exception of Fire Chief Raymond Senecal works in law enforcement. Senecal’s pay was $141,735, which made him the eighth highest-paid City Hall employee.

Rounding out that list, Public Safety Commissioner Wayne Bennett, Lt. Eric Clifford and Sean Clifford, who are brothers, and Jason Slingerland. Bennett, who retired as the superintendent of the State Police in 2007, received an insurance buyout of $4,888 because he is insured under his wife’s policy, according to Tiffany White, city personnel and benefits administrator.

All told 81 of the approximately 600 municipal employees collected over $100,000 in pay last year.

Mayor Gary McCarthy’s salary was $99,700. The mayor on Tuesday referred calls to McCracken and Bennett.

McCracken refused comment Tuesday. Bennett did not return a call.

Bennett said during the swearing-in of five police recruits that the 138-member department was not at full strength, according to City Councilman Vince Riggi, who attended the ceremony. If all the new recruits graduate from the police academy, that would boost the force to 143, which would still be 11 below the maximum number of officers.

In 2015, the city budgeted about $1.9 million for police overtime and paid nearly double that, roughly around $3.6 million, said White.

Riggi wondered what was fueling the continuing high level of overtime. “If it’s staff, we should seriously be looking at getting staffing up to where it should be,” he said. “In a perfect world, I would like a full complement of officers.”

City Councilwoman Marion Porterfield echoed those sentiments when a reporter told her about list of top earners for 2015.

“That says to me that we need more police officers,” said Porterfield. “I think part of the problem is we have fewer police officers than the force calls for”