Budget Ordinance Is Illegal, Court Says

An ordinance setting minimum budgets for Ventura County’s public safety agencies exceeded the electorate’s power and is unconstitutional, an appellate court ruled Thursday.

The decision by the 2nd District Court of Appeal reverses a lower court’s ruling that required the county Board of Supervisors to abide by the 1995 measure.

The ruling will have no immediate effect on those budgets, however, because the board and the agencies agreed to a new funding formula last year. Despite the agreement, the Board of Supervisors insisted that the ordinance’s constitutionality undergo appellate review.

In a strongly worded opinion, a three-justice panel found that the ordinance, which supervisors enacted to head off a ballot initiative, was illegal because it stripped the Board of Supervisors of its authority to set budgets for county departments.

If it were allowed to stand, other agencies could pass their own initiatives, claiming other chunks of the budget, the justices said.

The ordinance “not only chills the Board of Supervisors’ exclusive right to enact a budget, but may well end up freezing it out of existence,” the ruling states.

County officials said they were gratified by the ruling, especially since battles over the ordinance have cost them a lot of time and money in recent years.

“It’s a great reinforcement for the board to have hung tough on this issue,” Supervisor Steve Bennett said. “This ruling means that these kinds of initiatives will be less likely to happen.”

Meghan Clark, a lawyer for Sheriff Bob Brooks and Dist. Atty. Gregory Totten, said the ruling was disappointing.

They will huddle soon to decide whether to seek a review by the state Supreme Court, Clark said.

“For the district attorney and the sheriff, this has always been about the power of voters on spending issues,” she said. “This erodes the power of the voters on that issue.”

The measure never went before voters. Supervisors agreed to enact it without a vote after a citizens group collected a sufficient number of signatures to qualify it for the ballot.

After the 1995 ordinance was adopted, a complex funding formula was created to implement it, resulting in annual funding increases of up to 10% to public safety departments.

But in 2001, the Board of Supervisors voted to cap the annual increases at about 4%, arguing that the increases were draining the board’s ability to fully fund other departments.

Brooks and Totten sued the board in 2003, saying the new cap violated the ordinance. As the case was working its way through the courts, however, the two sides agreed in 2005 to a new funding plan.

The agreement allows the board to tie law enforcement budgets to the county’s financial health but gives those departments funding priority. Even with the new agreement, the departments’ budgets increased by nearly 10% in the current fiscal year.

County Counsel Noel Klebaum said Thursday’s appellate court ruling nullifies the 2005 agreement. In effect, Klebaum said, the Board of Supervisors is now is free to do whatever it wants with public safety budgets.

But county leaders were quick to insist that supervisors had no intention of cutting funds to those departments.

“Our settlement agreement was a very practical one, and this is the way we would want to do it, with or without a lawsuit,” said County Executive Officer Johnny Johnston. “I think we will probably always live by it.”

Bennett, too, said no budgetary changes were being contemplated. But the ruling does give the board more leeway if the county returns to the lean fiscal times of recent years, he said.

“We’ll still treat public safety fairly,” he said. “But we won’t be locked into budgeting by strict formula.”

Undersheriff Craig Husband said his department’s relationship with the Board of Supervisors has been excellent since last year’s settlement.

“They have been very supportive of our budgetary requests and of our recruiting efforts,” he said. “We’d love to see that continue.”