Children’s Home Will Add Beds in April : Budget: Orangewood had faced a proposal to delay its expansion, first set for January, until July. The county will also delay two other projects under the compromise.

The County Board of Supervisors, responding to pleas from advocates for children, agreed to a compromise budget plan Tuesday that will delay the opening of three new government facilities but will allow the crowded Orangewood Children’s Home to add more beds in April.

The supervisors’ decision comes several days after Orangewood leaders learned about a proposal to delay the opening of the home’s expansion from January until July. That was part of a county effort to close a midyear budget shortfall estimated at $15.5 million to $21 million.

Led by Orangewood Foundation Executive Director William G. Steiner, supporters of the home for abused and neglected children lobbied for the compromise that the supervisors approved.

Developer Kathryn G. Thompson, vice chairwoman of the foundation’s board of directors, wrote to County Administrative Officer Ernie Schneider last week to say that the foundation understood the county’s budget problems and could accept a delay of the opening until April.

The foundation has raised private donations to pay for building three new cottages at the Orangewood Home. The first cottage was scheduled to open in January, but county officials are scrambling to cut expenses, and their midyear budget proposal had recommended that facility openings be delayed, “where feasible,” until July.

“We’re very pleased by the outcome today,” Steiner said after the meeting. “But we’ve learned something this week. What we’ve learned is that in this recession, all bets are off. No program is sacred, and no cause is immune.”

Indeed, the supervisors voted to delay opening two other overdue county facilities. So a new jail intended to relieve overcrowding at Juvenile Hall and a new courthouse meant to serve juvenile offenders will both be delayed at least until July.

In both those cases, as well as that of Orangewood, the county has already paid to build the facilities, but the officials now face such serious budget problems that they have to postpone opening buildings that are completed and badly needed.

Temporary loss of the juvenile jail, known as the Intake and Reception Center, will be particularly hard to take, because Juvenile Hall typically holds about 350 youngsters, even though it was designed for 314. And that total is after early releases and special programs such as home confinement have winnowed the juvenile inmate population.

The new Intake and Reception Center is ready to begin taking 60 more juvenile offenders and was scheduled to open in January.

“We’ve been overcrowded for a good, long time,” said Michael Schumacher, the county’s chief probation officer. “We have a serious problem at Juvenile Hall, but we understand the budget situation.”

The continuing county shortfalls also raise questions about the scheduled opening of 400 new jail beds at the Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange, which the county desperately needs to relieve jail crowding. Although construction costs for that expansion have been budgeted, the county will have to cut from existing programs to pay the $10-million staffing costs of that facility when it is completed next year.

“I’m concerned about the funding of these facilities,” Supervisor Don R. Roth said. “Are we going to be like San Diego and have a jail that’s done and sitting empty?”

Faced with such difficult choices, Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder asked county staff members to study the budget implications of freezing all government employee salaries.

That suggestion prompted Supervisor Roger R. Stanton to slam his fist down on the table in disgust, but the board ended its session without discussing it. Neither supervisor was available for comment later.

The supervisors have been forced to contemplate virtually any proposal for budget cutting, however, as they wrestle with a shortfall brought on by the unexpectedly lengthy recession. All of the county’s major revenue sources are affected, and the government’s general fund is about $10 million below where officials had originally predicted, according to the county’s midyear budget report.

In addition, health and social service programs that receive money from the state are expected to be $5.5 million to $11.1 million short of original estimates this year.

“The projections were not optimistic,” Stanton said. “They were quite conservative. . . . Things got worse than we thought they were going to get.”

Moreover, officials said, it will probably get worse. Delaying the expansions of the three facilities will save the county about $770,000, but that will still leave roughly $9 million to trim. Health and social service areas could be particularly hard hit, because much of their money comes from state sales taxes, which are slumping badly in the recession.

Unless the supervisors make cuts now, they could face a shortfall of more than $56 million next summer, when the new fiscal year begins, officials warned.

The budget shortfall is a “serious situation, which in our opinion requires decisive action,” Schneider told the supervisors.