Deputies Accept Pay Freeze Until ’94

Sheriff’s deputies have agreed to postpone a pay raise and forgo bonuses to save the county $1 million and avoid cutting services, the sheriff told the Ventura County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday.

Under the plan, about 500 sheriff’s deputies will not receive $1,000 each in merit pay or a 4% pay raise scheduled for December until next summer.

In addition, the Sheriff’s Department recently announced a management reorganization that eliminated four positions, saving $500,000.

The $1.5 million in savings amounts to about a 3% cut for the department.

“My hope is that this is enough,” Sheriff Larry Carpenter said. “Anything more and we’re going to risk losing services.”

During budget workshops in June, Carpenter told the board that a 10% county-mandated budget cut would force him to end most investigations, close the East County Jail and lay off as many as 30 workers.

To prevent that, the board last week asked all county departments except for law enforcement to cut 5% more from their budgets in addition to the 10% to 12.5% cuts planned for the 1993-94 fiscal year.