Orangewood Chief Urges Lobbying Blitz : Budget: William G. Steiner says he’ll press county to keep children’s home expansion on schedule and asks powerful members of his board to do the same.

Stung by news that the expansion of the Orangewood Children’s Home could be delayed by county budget problems, the director of a private group paying the project’s construction costs urged members of his prestigious board Thursday to lobby county supervisors.

“This decision simply makes no sense,” William G. Steiner, director of the Orangewood Children’s Foundation, wrote in a memo to his 25-member board. “I will be appearing before the Board of Supervisors next Tuesday and of course urge you to join me in lobbying this on behalf of the children we serve.”

Steiner was one of several observers who were reeling Thursday after learning that the expansion, scheduled to open in January, could be postponed until July because of the county’s budget problems.

In his memo to the Orangewood Foundation board, Steiner suggested that the first piece of the expansion could be delayed until April 1, “but with referrals to Orangewood reaching a peak in the spring, I don’t know how we could wait longer.”

Steiner added that the delay and a jail expansion under way next door to Orangewood both have significant implications for the children’s home. As a result, he said, “it will probably be necessary to activate our Board Advocacy Committee in the near future.”

Any lobbying by the Orangewood Foundation board is sure to cause county supervisors to take notice, as the foundation board includes some of the county’s most respected and influential figures.

Steiner, for instance, is a councilman for the city of Orange who is well-liked by many county leaders. The foundation board is chaired by William Lyon, who heads the nation’s largest home-building firm. Kathryn G. Thompson, one of the county’s best-known developers, chairs the board’s building fund.

Thompson said she spoke to County Administrative Officer Ernie Schneider on Thursday. She added that she was confident that the foundation and county can agree to open the new bungalow in early April.

“We feel we could give them that breathing room,” she said. “But you cannot control child abuse, and we’ll need those beds.”

The Orangewood Foundation has collected nearly $3 million in private donations to pay for the construction of three new cottages that will add more than 70 beds for abused and neglected children. The first of those cottages is nearing completion.

New forecasts outlined in a midyear budget report, however, warn that the recession has taken a heavy toll on county finances. According to the report, the county faces a midyear shortfall of between $15.5 million and $21.1 million, and unless the supervisors act now the county could face a shortfall of $66.5 million by summer.

Officials in a number of county departments, especially health and social service areas, say they are bracing for cuts early next year.

For now, the report also recommends that the supervisors, “where feasible,” delay spending the operational money needed to open the Orangewood expansion, as well a new Juvenile Justice Center and the Probation Department’s Intake and Reception Center, which would have 60 beds for juvenile offenders.

“We have been working with both the board and county administrative office on both our bed-space requirements and budget issues,” Chief Deputy Probation Officer Stephanie Lewis said in a prepared statement. “They understand our need for additional bed space at Juvenile Hall. But if there is no adequate funding to open the IRC in the spring, then it will have to be delayed.”

Steiner was less sanguine.

“You don’t tell the police officer with a baby in his patrol car to keep driving around until there’s space at Orangewood,” he said. “We’ve followed through on our end of this. Now for the (county administrative office) to recommend no operational funds is really perplexing.”

County officials, meanwhile, were trying to minimize the effects of the delay, stressing that they are not cutting back existing programs and noting that one or more of the targeted facilities still could open before July if urgently needed.

“We’re trying to deal with this on a rational, businesslike basis,” said Ronald S. Rubino, the county budget director. “We feel that we have not cut any programs yet. We’ve just deferred a couple of things.”