Countywide : Departments Face Layoffs, Service Cuts

Ventura County department heads will have to lay off 19 employees and cut services to save $2.8 million in the latest round of budget-slashing measures ordered by the Board of Supervisors, officials said Thursday.

The layoffs and service reductions are part of a 2% across-the-board budget cut designed to make up for revenue losses in the upcoming year due to the recession.

Last year, most departments cut 5% of their budgets and froze hiring to save the county $6.6 million. The latest round of proposed budget cuts, outlined in a report that supervisors will consider Tuesday, would force departments to eliminate nine vacant positions.

County libraries in Ventura, Camarillo, Ojai, Port Hueneme and Simi Valley would close on Thursday evenings and Sunday afternoons to cut $86,000 from their budgets.

The district attorney’s office would lay off one person from its eight-member Victims Services Division and another person from its 36-member investigative staff to meet a $200,000 budget reduction.

The Corrections Services Agency would give up two probation officers and two clerks to absorb a $212,000 cut. An alternative proposal is to close the juvenile detention facility and transfer inmates to other facilities.

The public defender’s office would not accept any more death penalty cases and would impose a cap of 600 misdemeanor and 90 felony cases next year to meet its $90,000 cutback.

More cuts may be needed to balance the budget, county officials warned.