Sparks Fly as Carson Nears Vote on Budget

Almost five months into the fiscal year, Carson still has not approved a budget, and the fear, loathing and finger-pointing that sporadically erupt in the city’s intense politics have flared anew.

Monday night, the council is expected to vote on a new budget package that is $1.4 million less than the original $26.7-million spending plan proposed in June, with $567,000 coming out of the community development budget and $462,000 lopped off the parks and recreation budget.

But it appears unlikely that a simple vote will settle Carson’s spending priorities. New programs and personnel will be considered in a separate, supplemental budget that is not completed, and the new city administrator is promising to reorganize the staff and set up more stringent budget procedures.

But most important, an election is coming up in the spring for the three council seats now occupied by members of the controlling council faction. The handling of the budget is sure to be an issue in what augurs to be hard-fought reelection bids by council members Michael Mitoma, Vera Robles DeWitt and Kay Calas.

Accusations about what went wrong in the current budget process are flying in all directions:

Mitoma, elected in March as the crucial third vote in the council alliance up for reelection, blames council opponents Tom Mills and Sylvia Muise and former City Administrator John Dangleis for “rubber-stamping” staff recommendations when they dominated city government.

Mills, in turn, criticizes the new city administrator, Dick Gunnarson, installed in May against his and Muise’s wishes, as a “novice” who doesn’t know what he is doing. Mills says his council opponents, who control the budget committee, are taking too long to present a budget to the full council.

Gunnarson says the staff he inherited had padded the original budget, making cuts necessary. He said he considers criticism from Mills and Muise to be political maneuvering intended to boost their candidates in the spring.

Finance Director William Parrott, who reports to Gunnarson, says his boss is just out to make a name for himself by bad-mouthing old-guard staffers.

Even with the extra time expended on the budgeting process, Gunnarson said, “I can in no way certify that all this money is going to be well spent.”

Next year, he vowed, the budget will be on time and properly done.

Yet despite uncertainties about the final budget, city government has continued to operate. Unaffected by the escalating rhetoric, rank-and-file employees process the building permits, issue business licenses and take care of myriad housekeeping activities.

However, new city programs and projects, with the exception of the city’s hotel and office redevelopment project, have been put on the back burner because the council has not approved money for them. In addition, Gunnarson has taken months to fill department head vacancies, and the new officials have yet to establish priorities for their departments.

Only $220,000 to Spare

Council members realized in June that they had problems when the draft budget began circulating. Finance Director Parrott’s directive to department heads was to turn in a “bare-bones” budget--no new programs or new personnel. Even so, the draft proposal left the city with only $220,000 to spend on new programs and staff because of a limit set by the state Gann amendment. (The Gann amendment limits budget increases according to a formula based on population increase and inflation.)

If the council wanted to spend more on new ventures, it would have to make cuts in the budget for existing programs. Parrott’s budget said that $1.5 million could be cut from the draft proposal, but he did not say which department budgets should get the knife.

Mayor Pro Tem DeWitt told Parrott she was unhappy with his suggestion and that more scrutiny was required. To provide that scrutiny, the council set up a budget committee and on June 29 named Mitoma its first member. DeWitt, a Mitoma ally, later was named to the panel.

Since both council members are part of the same faction, Muise began sitting in on the panel as a non-voting observer. Otherwise, the state open-government law would have required the committee to give public notice of meetings and agendas, and members said that would be too cumbersome.

Going over the budget line by line, Gunnarson said, the committee soon discovered that Parrott’s instructions to department heads to prepare a “bare-bones” budget request had not been followed.

“We found that, on evaluating it, that every department had violated those instructions,” Gunnarson said. “Every damn one of them fudged it.”

Said DeWitt: “It was a mess.”

For example, the Finance Department had itself proposed new positions. The Community Development Department wanted $25,000 to attend conferences, yet had not spent anywhere close to that amount the previous year, according to Gunnarson.

In another example, Mayor Calas said city staffers had budgeted more than the amount required for retirement funds by “a couple hundred thousands.”

“It doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up,” she said.

Applied to Unused Funds

In the Parks and Recreation Department, an inflation increase of between 4% and 5% was applied to funds in the 1986-87 budget that had not been spent.

To pare the budget, the committee decided to follow two rules: Eliminate new programs and staff, and cut out money that had been budgeted the previous year but had not been used.

These rules chopped deepest at community development and parks and recreation budgets:

The Community Development Department had a 1986-87 budget of $1.6 million, but spent only $1.1 million. In the 1987-88 budget, it proposed spending $1.8 million. The committee’s recommended cut was $567,000 from the proposal, knocking out a study for the central part of the city. Gunnarson said it is doubtful that the city will be able to begin work on the study in this fiscal year; it may be put back in a supplemental budget for new programs.

The Parks and Recreation Department had a 1986-87 budget of $8.4 million, spent $7.9 million and asked for $8.8 million in 1987-88. The committee’s proposed cut was $462,000, mainly in contract services and permanent part-time employees.

Mills, however, said the process should have been a lot speedier.

“I cannot see the logic of all the time that has been used,” he said. Following the committee’s method of making cuts, a budget should “have been ready in a week,” he said.

He attributed the delay to Gunnarson being “a novice for a city administrator.” Gunnarson had once been Carson’s planning director but has never been a city manager. In addition, Mills said, “committee functions take a heck of a lot longer than direct deliberation on the council floor.”

Despite criticism of the delays, Mills and Muise voted against approving the budget Nov. 2, forcing a further delay when the vote split 2-2 along factional lines. (Calas was ill and did not attend the meeting.) Mills said he voted against adopting the budget because the committee had not made a report to the council. Muise could not be reached for comment.

Mitoma, however, defended Gunnarson as “well experienced and knowledgeable.” He added that Mills and the rest of the council had been fully informed of committee recommendations by memos prepared after each meeting. He said the extra time was needed because of an accumulation of problems stemming from the way the city staff and council handled the budget for years.

“I handle budgets all the time,” said Mitoma, who is president of Pacific Business Bank in Carson. “I just can’t believe how this was going. . . . The city has a budgeting process that really did not have any rhyme or reason. . . .

“Everybody had their little pet projects and as long as they got approved, it was OK. . . . The budgeting process before was easy: You bring out your stuff and Tom (Mills) brings out his rubber stamp or Sylvia (Muise) brings out her rubber stamp and that is that.”

Carson Called Exemplary

Parrott defended his handling of the spending plan, adding that national and state organizations for finance directors in 1986 had cited Carson as exemplary for the way the city puts out the budget.

“I believe in doing my job and being recognized for it. I do not believe in being a scapegoat. I am the finance director. I am the expert. Dick (Gunnarson) is not. The council is not. The new (department heads) are not,” he said.

“I do resent the inference that some of the old guard make easy targets for mudslinging. . . . I just get a little mad and teed off when someone is making false statements just to make themselves look good.” He added that he was referring to his boss, Gunnarson.

Gunnarson, in response, said the old-line staff has “got to take their lumps. I can document every (criticism) if they want to argue about it.”

Mitoma expressed surprise that Carson’s handling of the budget had been awarded prizes.

“Parrott may have won some awards. I don’t know how,” he said tartly.