Supervisors Told Cuts Will Give Crime a Big Edge

Proposed cuts in the Orange County budget for the 1990-91 fiscal year would put more criminals on the streets with depleted sheriff’s patrols to pursue them and fewer prosecutors to send them to jail, county officials warned the Board of Supervisors in a bleak session Wednesday.

That was only the beginning.

Jail overcrowding, already a serious problem in the county, would probably increase, as would police response times, officials said. Other cuts would threaten county services for abused women and children, leave mentally ill people at risk and strip medically indigent patients of badly needed health care services, according to testimony from more than a dozen officials and community activists.

And though officials are trying to avoid laying off any of the county’s 16,000 employees by shifting workers around instead of firing them, some workers may ultimately lose their jobs.

Hearing one dire prediction after another, Board Chairman Don R. Roth looked up from behind his microphone at one point and pleaded: “Tell me some good news, will you?”

Wednesday’s three-hour session, the first and probably the most controversial of three scheduled public hearings dealing with this year’s budget, featured requests for more money from many of the county’s leading figures, including Dist. Atty. Michael Capizzi and Sheriff Brad Gates. And even though budget hearings often feature worst-case scenarios by officials pleading for their departments’ budgets, all agreed that this year’s situation is genuinely grim.

The county’s fiscal condition, already precarious, is worsened by the prospect of further cuts from Sacramento, assuming that state legislators and Gov. George Deukmejian can ever overcome their 26-day deadlock over the state budget, which provides about $37 million a month to the county.

“The situation that we are faced with is very serious,” County Administrative Officer Ernie Schneider acknowledged during the hearing. “Obviously, we have a big challenge in front of us.”

Schneider’s office has recommended cutting 5% from all county department budgets in an effort to make up part of a predicted shortfall of $37 million in this fiscal year’s budget. Some departments have balked at trimming 5%, but Schneider and others warn that even further cuts will probably be needed.

During the session, both Capizzi and Gates said they feared that cuts to their departments would endanger public safety by making it harder to respond to crimes, investigate them and bring the criminals to trial.

The cuts, Capizzi said, “would be devastating to our ability to prosecute crimes in this community.”

A 5% cut in the district attorney’s budget, he said, would jeopardize the jobs of 25 of his roughly 400 employees and would force reductions in programs that work with abused women and children. It would also weaken the district attorney’s ability to prepare cases, giving aid and comfort to accused criminals and their lawyers, Capizzi said.

Gates presented a list of cuts that his 2,100-employee department would have to make if it absorbed the entire $5.4-million reduction that county staff has recommended. Although Gates did not predict layoffs in his department, he said that he would have to leave some vacancies unfilled and that officers would take on additional burdens, adding to police response time and delaying investigations.

In the area of health care, county officials predict even larger cuts than those being made to law enforcement activities. But Health Care Agency officials, who are bracing for reductions of $11 million to $18 million, did not speak during Wednesday’s session, in part because their budget is closely linked to Sacramento’s. As a result, they will not have a clear idea of the funds available to them until the state approves its budget.

That did not stop more than 20 citizens, many representing local health care groups, from voicing their concern. Without exception, the citizens asked supervisors to make health care a top priority of the county.