County Seeking Ways to Trim Services Agency : Government: Board orders study aimed at eliminating duplication, waste and red tape.

Orange County supervisors, looking for ways to trim the size of government, on Tuesday ordered a top-to-bottom review of the county’s General Services Agency in hope of eliminating red tape and waste.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Roger R. Stanton said a specially formed committee will be charged with determining which GSA functions are “absolutely necessary” and asking the question, “Should we be doing this at all?”

The General Services Agency is one of the county’s largest departments, with an annual budget of about $170 million and total staff of more than 1,800 people. It has responsibility for virtually all internal services in the county, from phones and computers to transportation and real estate.

Any changes that come out of the GSA study will probably be felt only by county workers themselves, since the agency’s role is limited to the county’s internal operations. “The public won’t notice these changes directly,” GSA Director Bert Scott said.

As costs have risen and state revenues have dropped in recent years, county government has wrestled with budget deficits reaching tens of millions of dollars. In response, the county has put in place hiring freezes, closed some facilities, and cut services in health care, welfare and other areas.

Now, as state budget numbers portend another fiscal crisis next summer, county officials are undertaking broad organizational reviews in several key areas to try to head off more severe budget slashing later, officials say.

Supervisor Gaddi H. Vasquez, who proposed the GSA study along with Stanton, said the move should signal that budget problems at the state and county levels “are by no means over.”

The GSA review ordered Tuesday follows a similar study that led supervisors in July to consolidate services and cut staff levels by 20% at the Environmental Management Agency, which oversees county beaches, parks, wildlife protection and land-use issues, among other areas.

The county has started a similar review of its Integrated Waste Management Department, which runs county trash operations and landfills.

Under Tuesday’s decision by the Board of Supervisors, a committee composed of county officials both inside and out the GSA is to develop a work plan for the study within 30 days.

Scott said he expects the committee to take several months to review the agency’s operations and make recommendations to the board. “We don’t want--and I don’t anticipate the board does either--that this thing will drag out interminably,” he said.

While officials are uncertain what recommendations may come out of the GSA review, Stanton said he expects the committee to identify “redundancies” in agency operations, cut red tape and find areas of service that the county can turn over to the private sector.

The supervisors did approve one GSA cost-cutting move Tuesday, agreeing to a new, five-year contract with Southern California Edison that is expected to save the county $253,000. Edison will lower the county’s rates in exchange for an agreement that allows the company to temporarily shut down power at a handful of buildings if there is a system overload.

“It’s a calculated risk, but we think it’s worth it,” Scott said.

In other business Tuesday, the supervisors also picked San Juan Capistrano-based EPT Landscape Architecture to do the first phase of work on the proposed 106-acre Bolsa Chica Linear Park in Huntington Beach. The county has already approved $720,000 in funding for the first phase, which is to include biking, hiking and equestrian trails, along with planting and irrigation work.