Chief Finds Few Cost-Saving Options, Suggests Tax Hike : Police: San Clemente Peace Officers Assn. members, who oppose merger with Sheriff’s Department, also plan to push for a tax increase.

Police Chief Michael Sorg, who opposes hiring the Orange County Sheriff’s Department to assume law enforcement services here, said in a recent report that he nevertheless found “few answers” to dramatically cut costs and keep services at acceptable levels.

In the 27-page report, presented to the City Council last week, Sorg reluctantly suggested that the financially troubled city could save about $277,000 by cutting several civilian positions, including two community service officers, two crime prevention officers, records clerks and a part-time property/evidence technician.

He also suggested that the city could save an estimated $200,000 by hiring a private company to repair and maintain the department’s vehicle fleet, or save an undetermined amount by hiring the Sheriff’s Department to take over some services, including recruiting and training.

Other than those potential cuts, Sorg said he could not recommend any other reductions in the 65-year-old department. Instead, he suggested there might be some way to “convince the community it is in their own best interest to support a tax increase to pay for all of the projected shortfalls in the city’s budget.”

“We’ve civilian-ized, we’ve automated, we’ve implemented volunteer programs, we’ve stretched and we’ve done without,” Sorg said in the report. “Despite this, we’ve still maintained an enviable effectiveness rate. To think we can further reduce our patrol or administrative staffs and maintain our effectiveness, especially when three different studies say otherwise, is simply kidding ourselves.”

Members of the San Clemente Peace Officers Assn., who also oppose the merger, said they too would push for a tax increase.

“I think we’d all agree that we’re a bare-bones department right now,” said Officer Andy Ferguson, president of the association. “We just can’t see any cuts. We’d like to stay as a police department. Obviously, if the tax increase is what it takes to keep us here, that’s what we’ll need.”

Sorg said he would recommend disbanding the department only if residents rejected a tax proposal and the City Council could only save the department by making drastic service cuts.

“If that is what the Council and community want, we will continue to function in the caring and professional manner the community has come to expect,” he said in the report.

At the request of the City Council, the Sheriff’s Department recently made a proposal to assume law enforcement duties for about $5.78 million per year, a savings to the city of about $2 million. Under that proposal, street patrol officers would also increase by as much as 75% at night and 35% during the day, and 48 sworn police officers would get pay raises of about $10,000 to $14,000 per year should they choose to become deputies.

In his report, however, Sorg said city officials would be doing a “disservice” to the community if they only consider the money aspects of the issue.

“A local department cannot spread its costs across the county like the county sheriff can, so it will always be cheaper to contract with the sheriff,” Sorg said. “A local department may be able to do some things differently and save some money, but on a dollar-for-dollar comparison, there’s little argument.

“Therefore, the question which the council must consider is why the overwhelming majority of incorporated cities across America opt to break away from their counties and establish their own police departments.”

In overall performance, Sorg said the department is doing “more and more, with less and less” and compares favorably with the departments of other cities of the same size.

With a population of 43,125, the San Clemente Police Department costs each resident about $147 per year, among the lowest in the county, Sorg said.

And while the department has had to cut costs, crime and calls for service have increased, Sorg said. Violent crimes in the city doubled in the past two years, while annual calls for service jumped from 15,000 to about 25,000 in the past two years. Still, San Clemente continues to have one of the lowest crime rates in the county, Sorg said.