The Case for Streamlining Civil Service

On Jan. 15, a frustrated Los Angeles County Chief Administrative Officer Richard B. Dixon sent a confidential memo to one of his more trusted subordinates, Barry J. Nidorf, who heads the huge Probation Department.

The memo envisions eliminating Civil Service protections for many of the county’s 80,000 employees. As it surfaced--leaked by anti-Dixon employees--county workers, already engaged in a dispute with their bosses over wages and benefits, grew more restive.

Like any boss, Dixon wants to rid his work force of those he considers non-producers or slow producers. But his efforts have been blocked by Civil Service laws and regulations designed to protect the workers from unjust firing and discipline.

So Dixon asked Nidorf to head a Task Force on Civil Service Streamlining, charged with finding “a more expeditious process to remove an employee who either no longer wishes to produce or is unable to produce in our new corporate environment.”

The task force, Dixon said, “should not only look at quick fixes but at long-range radical reform.” At the bottom of the memo, Dixon hand-wrote a final admonition to Nidorf: “Thank you and each member for undertaking this VERY IMPORTANT effort!”

As you might imagine from your own work experience, the employees aren’t exactly cheering. Many fear that crackdowns against “non-producers” will turn into vendettas against dissenters and people the boss just doesn’t like.

I first heard about the proposal from Guido De Rienzo, a staff representative of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents many county workers.

I’ve known De Rienzo since the early ‘80s when he was a community activist around Los Angeles City Hall campaigning for low-cost housing. He’s Dixon’s ideological and tactical opposite. Dixon is chilly, well-organized, dressed perfectly in conservative dark suits. De Rienzo fights his battles with emotion, his coat unbuttoned, his face earnest as he prowls the Board of Supervisors’ meeting room.

He told me that Dixon had a “hidden agenda” of wiping out Civil Service and breaking the unions. Dixon, he said, is trying to slowly persuade the five supervisors to back him. By giving me a copy of the memo, De Rienzo hoped to blow the Dixon plan out of the water.

De Rienzo’s complaints had a certain believability.

Dixon has amassed great power in the past few years. The supervisors have ceded him vast power in writing the budget. At the same time, he’s gained authority over department heads, recommending to the supes whether these top staffers get raises and other perks.

Looking at excerpts of the task force report prepared by Nidorf for Dixon, it looked like the proposed changes would give the chief administrator even more power--and could stifle dissent.

That’s an important issue in the county today. Whistle-blowers are popping up all over the place, giving the press and supervisors stories of executive mismanagement and waste. Whistle-blowers revealed the details of an expensive controversial remodeling of Dixon’s office. An equally controversial program of executive bonuses came to the attention of Supervisor Gloria Molina through the efforts of unhappy employes.

A preliminary report by Nidorf’s task force recommends that current Civil Service protection be eliminated, and that vast powers to promote, demote and fire be placed in the hands of department heads, who report to Dixon.

Dixon had another slant when I talked to him Wednesday.

What do you do when you can’t fire an incompetent or dangerous employee? he asked me.

He cited the case of two white sheriff’s deputies who were fired by Sheriff Sherman Block for burning a cross in a jail area where black gang members were housed. A Civil Service Commission hearing officer upheld the firings. But the full commission ordered a new hearing. By that time, key witnesses had vanished. So Block, rather than engage in a futile hearing, rehired the two deputies.

“Four years ago,” said Dixon, “we had a couple of deputies who literally tortured a suspect. We fired them. By the time it went to the Civil Service Commission, the tortured man had been deported. The Civil Service Commission examiner did not sustain the firing and the commission said (the deputies) had to go back to work.”

That’s a strong pitch. The Latino and African-American communities are demanding that lawbreaking deputies be fired. Dixon said that Civil Service streamlining will give the county the tools to do it.

It is a tough argument for De Rienzo and other union leaders to counter.