State Slashes Enforcement of Liquor Laws : Alcohol: Budget cuts shift focus from policing violations to handling a backlog of applications for licenses.

In the wake of budget cuts that have reduced the number of state investigators by more than half, the Wilson Administration has curtailed efforts by the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control to enforce liquor laws such as the prohibition of sales to minors, officials said Thursday.

Administration officials said all remaining ABC enforcement officers are being shifted from policing activities to licensing to handle a growing backlog of applications for liquor licenses. Officials said once the backlog is reduced, they hope to return the officers to enforcement duties.

The backlog is said to be the worst in the ABC’s offices in Los Angeles, Long Beach and Santa Ana. Restaurant and bar owners now are being told they will have to wait until Aug. 1 to even apply for a license.

Officials justified the trade-off between enforcement and processing licenses on the grounds that licensing more liquor establishments will help the economy. Manuel R. Espinoza, deputy director of the ABC, said more licenses will “broaden the tax base” and “create more jobs.” He said he hopes local police agencies will pick up the enforcement slack, but conceded “it’s a gamble.”

Costa Mesa Police Chief Dave Snowden, president of the California Police Chiefs’ Assn., said that de-emphasizing enforcement was “a bad, bad policy.”

“A lot of bars will stay in business that shouldn’t, and a lot of minors will be served in violation of the law,” he said.

Since Gov. Pete Wilson reduced the ABC’s annual budget from $23.5 million to $19 million last year, the agency, which had 402 people on the payroll in 1991, has lost more than 165 employees. Investigators were hit hardest, with 96 officers eliminated. When the cuts were made, critics predicted enforcement efforts would have to be curtailed.

At one point, the Administration contemplated layoffs. But so many employees left voluntarily that officials say layoffs will no longer be necessary. Most of the employees who left the agency found work in other state departments.

In the ABC’s Long Beach office, supervising investigator Richard Henry said that because of budget cuts the office has lost four of five clerks and expects to lose the fifth. It is also down to two investigators, from 11. He predicted that local police will not be able to monitor bars and liquor stores.

“In my opinion, what you are going to have is open season. We are going on the honor system. We just hope it isn’t fatal,” Henry said.

ABC officials said that even with the de-emphasis on enforcement they will try to investigate complaints passed along by local police agencies.