CHP Academy Closed Until Operating Funds Are Found : Budget: El Toro Marine passed all the tests and had a job offer--until class was suspended. He’s among hundreds left on hold.

After a year of intensive background checks, face-to-face interviews and a battery of tests, El Toro Marine Sgt. Jose Maldonado in December was rewarded with a job offer from the California Highway Patrol.

But instead of receiving a letter a month later telling him when to report to the CHP’s training academy in Sacramento, Maldonado got one that informed him that his class was suspended indefinitely for lack of money.

“I was waiting for a letter that said, ‘Congratulations,’ but instead I got one that said, ‘Hold on,’ ” lamented the 27-year-old Puerto Rican native, who was discharged from the Marine Corps last week. “This is terrible. I’ve been more than patient.”

Maldonado is one of 363 successful Highway Patrol applicants who were notified since January that the statewide agency is temporarily closing the doors to its prestigious training academy in the face of an unforeseen, $12.6-million shortfall for this fiscal year.

The last class of Highway Patrol men and women graduated on Thursday. And for at least the next six months, CHP officials said, no new recruits will go through the rigorous, 21-week training course.

“When (the last 64 graduates) leave, this place will be vacant,” Highway Patrol spokesman Sam Haynes said.

The suspension marked the first time that the 13-year-old academy, considered by many authorities to be the best law enforcement training facility in the state, has been forced to cease operations because of budget problems, CHP officials said.

It also comes amid increasing concerns about law enforcement training in the aftermath of the Rodney King beating case. Four CHP officers were among several officers who reportedly stood by as four Los Angeles policemen severely beat King. In addition, a pair of CHP officers in San Francisco were recently accused of brutality in a videotaped beating of an anti-war demonstrator.

“It all relates back to training and constant training of our police officers,” said state Sen. Cecil N. Green (D-Norwalk), a member of the Senate Transportation Committee, which oversees CHP funding.

CHP Commissioner Maury Hannigan said that the agency hopes to reopen the academy on Sept. 9. Despite the closure, Hannigan said the agency remains fully staffed and he does not expect any loss of services to the public.

But that could change if next fiscal year’s budget is not amended, Hannigan said. The 1991-92 budget has already been approved and does not reflect higher operating costs.

“If (budget problems) don’t level off in the next couple of months, we may have to go to the state Legislature to augment the budget,” Hannigan said. “Everybody is feeling the pinch.”

Indeed, lawmakers said, agencies all over the state are faced with financial troubles as the current recession begins to take its toll.

But some members of the Senate Transportation Committee said on Friday that they will take a hard look at the agency’s budget woes and consider several recommendations, including additional funding to keep the academy open.

“The academy should be on line, there’s no question in my mind,” Green said. “The way we keep quality in our patrol officers is directly related to how that academy does its job.”

State Sen. Quentin L. Kopp (I-San Francisco), chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, said Friday that a bill he has authored may provide financial relief to the beleaguered department as early as July.

The bill is now in the Transportation Committee and could reach the floor for a vote by May. It would raise fees for vehicle registrations by $5 and for driver’s licenses by $2, producing enough revenue to alleviate the CHP’s budget problems and allow the academy to reopen.

The department began experiencing financial troubles after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August, Hannigan said. It was not entirely coincidental.

As wide-scale anti-war demonstrations became commonplace in San Francisco and elsewhere in the state, more than 700 patrolmen were called in on crowd-control duty. The overtime costs incurred by demonstrations added up to $1.5 million, Hannigan said.

And swelling gasoline prices saddled the 6,200-member force with $3 million in additional fuel bills.

Other unexpected expenditures included $4 million in compensation benefits that the agency had to pay after a newly enacted law prompted 200 Highway Patrol employees to delay retirement for one year to earn a higher pension, Hannigan said.

About $4.1 million in unbudgeted insurance payments to the Workers’ Compensation fund also added to the agency’s problems.

In addition to the temporary hiring freeze of new patrol officers and suspension of academy training, the agency has:

* Cut back on overtime payments, offering compensatory time off for the first 11 hours of extra time worked. Most overtime is earned by officers manning sobriety checkpoints, car-pool lane enforcement, court appearances and serious accidents.

* Canceled all in-service training, including refresher courses, that are indirectly related to an officer’s assigned job.

* Canceled all plans for hiring temporary employees, mostly to fill administrative posts.

“We are cutting away at the (shortfall) through some of the steps we are taking,” Hannigan said.

The academy, founded in 1976, has graduated 4,680 patrol officers. All officers hired by the department must go through the grueling training course before assignment to one of the agency’s 99 offices, CHP spokesman Haynes said.

Patterned after the military, recruits live in austere dormitories and follow a structured day of classes, physical fitness and hazardous-driving training.

“Every aspect of your life is under a microscope,” said Patrolman Mark Garrett, who received his badge Thursday night and will be assigned to the department’s Verdugo Hills office in Los Angeles County.

In the meantime, prospective recruits will continue to wait, look for a new career choice or be satisfied with a temporary job while the CHP cures its financial ills, CHP officials said.

For some, it has been an emotional roller-coaster.

“I’ve had my ups and downs,” said James Zembsh, a 29-year-old dental-equipment technician who was told he passed the application process in 1989 but has yet to start. “I hear rumors about classes coming up and I hope they are going to take me. It’s kind of hard to stay motivated.”

Others, like Maldonado, had pinned their immediate future plans on a CHP career.

“I turned down an offer to re-enlist (in the military) because I told them I already have a career (planned) in the California Highway Patrol,” said Maldonado, an eight-year veteran of the Marine Corps who wants to follow a family tradition by getting into the law enforcement field.

“Right now, I am in a standby mode, waiting between jobs,” Maldonado said.