Deputies Abandon Slowdown, Seek New Way to Budge Board

The Orange County sheriff’s deputies’ union Thursday called off a work slowdown that has clogged courthouses for eight days but failed to win wage demands from the county.

Robert MacLeod, general manager of the Assn. of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs, said the union plans to begin another job action next week that will have a stronger and different impact on the county.

MacLeod said the union is considering staging a strike next week, even though county officials have said that would be an illegal act that jeopardizes public safety.

“If the action we take is a strike or the equivalent, we will make every effort to take measures to make sure that it does not directly impact the public,” MacLeod said.

“Our sole purpose in any job action we have is to get a contract, and obviously these actions have not given us a contract.”

MacLeod said union officials believe the work slowdown was effective in showing that there is support among the membership for higher wages.

“But at this point, (the slowdown) has outlived its usefulness,” he said. “We will go through actions that prove futile as long as we have to. The important thing is if the board feels they pulled off a big victory through this, they should remember this is only round one, there are 14 more to go.”

John Sibley, county director of employee relations, said Thursday that he did not feel victorious over the development but insisted that the county will not budge in its wage offer.

“Threatening the Board of Supervisors or the people of Orange County is going to be counterproductive,” Sibley said.

Talks with the deputies broke down Aug. 17, when the county offered a 12.5% pay raise over three years but with just 2% in the first year. The union demanded 16% over three years and more money in the first year.

Orange County officials recently adopted one of their tightest budgets, and they have said there is not enough money to meet the union demands.

“The point is, they want something we can’t give them,” Sibley said.

The slowdown has involved about 350 deputies assigned to the county jails and those responsible for transporting the prisoners from the jails to the courthouses. There are 1,100 members of the deputies’ union.

The effect has been that prisoners who usually would have arrived at court before 9 a.m. have not shown up until almost 4 p.m. The prisoners have also been returned to the jail late, almost midnight one night, while they are usually back for dinner at 6 p.m.

Roger R. Stanton, chairman of the Board of Supervisors, did not return two calls to his office about the union’s job action Thursday.

Judges throughout the court system have become increasingly frustrated with the slowdown, with some taking actions such as detaining sheriff’s buses or ordering prisoners held at local city jails.

Marshal James C. Byham, whose officers billed the county for more than $10,000 in overtime because of the deputy sheriffs’ delays, said Thursday that the union’s decision to end the slowdown “is fantastic. I think they (deputy marshals) are all extremely happy. It’s been tough.”

The marshals, who are responsible for guarding prisoners in the courthouses, had been working late when the sheriff’s buses didn’t show up on time.

“It creates a strain,” Byham said. “They (sheriff’s deputies) are brother officers.”

In North Orange County Municipal Court, Judge Margaret R. Anderson had written a personal check for $125 worth of hamburgers and milkshakes Wednesday night because she said the prisoners stuck at the courthouses were not getting hot meals.

Anderson said Thursday the North Court judges planned to continue to feed the prisoners from Jack-in-the-Box every night the slowdown continued. But by 5 p.m., she said a bus had already arrived to return some of that day’s inmates to the jail.

“It’s wonderful,” she said. “Tomorrow morning we’ll see if they’re here on time, that will be the test.”