County Job Security Becomes Thing of the Past : Layoffs: In previous years, laid-off employees could take demotions to other jobs or hope to be reassigned. As the budget crunch deepens, government workers with pink slips are facing uncertain futures.

Christine Perry is no stranger to bad economic times.

In her working career, the 45-year-old Orange County government warehouse worker has been laid off at least twice. Both times, the notice came in the form of a pink slip and a last paycheck.

“That’s when it’s really a shock,” Perry said, “when you show up for work and they tell you to clock back out because they don’t need you any more.”

This time, with the economy a shambles and with local tax revenue being used to plug holes in the state budget, she and others in county government service at least saw it coming.

The Riverside resident, whose round-trip commute averages about two hours each day, was one of dozens of county workers who have been issued recent layoff notices in the aftermath of unprecedented budget cuts totaling more than $150 million.

County officials said Friday that about 80 workers, a greater number of layoffs than officials can remember in recent years, have been placed on notice so far, and more are likely when a final county budget is passed next month.

For Perry and about 28 others, the blow has been softened considerably because they have elected to take reassignments or reductions in rank to avoid an uncertain job market. But at least 50 others, county managers said, still face unpredictable futures and soon could be walking out the door.

“I always heard that when you get a government job, you’ve got it made,” Perry said. “But that’s not true any more. County government is like any other business now. There are going to be layoffs.”

And like any other business, job-security worries have been swirling in local government offices, warehouses, drafting rooms and jail facilities since last month when the state forced the transfer of millions in local property tax revenue to ease its own budget deficit.

“With the state budget problems like they were, this year has been such a protracted situation,” said Richard A. Silva, classification manager in the county’s Personnel Department. “When you can’t give somebody a definitive answer, rumors tend to abound. It’s not a comfortable situation.”

Already, county officials have hosted two seminars in recent weeks to prepare the affected employees to both cope with the possibility of lost employment and prepare for new job searches. Efforts have been made to reassign or “bump” some workers to vacant government positions, but that chore has been made especially difficult since the county eliminated more than 1,000 vacant positions this year to further cut expenses.

Of those who have opted for reassignments, General Services Administration Personnel Manager Steve Snyder said some have taken salary reductions of up to 20%, or about $400 per month. Transfers have employees moving to jobs in all parts of county service. One warehouse worker, for example, has already started new duty as a “kennel attendant” at the Orange County Animal Shelter in Orange.

“They’ve been taking it pretty well,” said Snyder, whose government agency was among the hardest hit by employee cuts. “There have been no hostile reactions like the kind you read about happening in the workplace. It’s difficult for all of us to take.”

Even those who have managed to avoid the budget ax have shown signs of stress, Snyder said. “They personalize it. These are people who have families and expenses, and they are concerned about how deep and how long our layoff process will go.”

According to county officials, those concerns are very real as the county comes to the end of a third consecutive year of deep service cuts. In 1991, layoffs totaled seven workers; last year, about 25 workers left the county as a result of the budget cuts.

Prospects for improvement are not looking brighter.

On Tuesday, county supervisors approved one-year contracts for 14,000 union and management employees that include no salary increases, even though deputies with the Orange County Sheriff’s Department were able to win raises just last fall.

“Everybody is aware that these are rough times,” said Jan Walden, deputy employee relations manager with the county. “I don’t know that the situation was exactly the same” for sheriff’s deputies. “Each negotiation has a life of its own.”

In just a few months, failure of a ballot measure to extend the half-cent sales tax could make more layoffs a virtual certainty. Without passage of the tax extension, Sheriff Brad Gates has warned that he could be forced to close one of the five county jails and issue layoff notices to dozens of workers.

“This won’t be the end of it,” Silva said. “It’s going to be a continuous thing.”