Riley Offers Plan to Free Up $350,000 to Help Ease Cutbacks to Libraries : Proposal: Supervisor seeks a one-time $350,000 discount that could keep the facilities open an extra day each week.

The county library system, hardest hit by budget reductions, was thrown a lifeline Wednesday when county supervisors offered a plan that could keep branch and regional libraries open one additional day a week.

The proposal, offered by Supervisor Thomas F. Riley, called for a one-time discount of $350,000 in county maintenance and administrative costs, freeing up additional funds for staffing and the restoration of children’s programs. With the new funds, some libraries would be able to operate four days a week, and others five days.

The plan, which must be ratified next month when the final budget is approved, came during the second day of county budget hearings and was one in a series of actions aimed at either restoring lost programs or scrounging for additional sources of money in a particularly spare budget year.

Among the new proposals introduced Wednesday, Riley also called for the possible renegotiation of boat slip and retail leases on county tidelands as a way to increase revenue. On a separate front, Supervisor Roger R. Stanton requested a six-month study of county costs in providing legal representation to local indigents. In a letter to the board, Stanton said those costs have tripled in the past decade, from $10.5 million in 1983-84 to $30.7 million in 1993-94.

For libraries, the one-time discount applied to overhead costs does not come close to matching an overall $8-million reduction in funding for the county’s 27 branch facilities. The cuts required a 44% reduction in service hours and the loss of 70 part-time librarians, limiting most branches to three-day workweeks.

According to Riley’s plan, the $350,000 discount would apply to money the library system pays for various in-house services, from maintenance to legal representation provided by the county counsel’s office.

“While this one-time action will not come close to closing the gap in (the) funding shortfall,” Riley said, “it will allow Orange County residents to obtain greater access to services of their libraries.”

Since the discount would only apply to this year, county officials are already reviewing a number of funding alternatives to help save some branch libraries from possible closure next year. Under discussion are charges for reserving popular books and fees for retrieving books from other libraries.

Already at risk is the scheduled opening next summer of the $5-million library in Rancho Santa Margarita. Construction of the library has been financed with developer fees, but officials fear the county may not have the money to staff the facility or buy books.

Riley’s plan seemed to be welcomed by other supervisors, but it was not immediately known how or when the new library schedules would be implemented.

In an attempt to squeeze more money from government in future years, the South County supervisor also asked for the review of tideland leases throughout the county, which nets local government more than $4 million each year.

Riley said some of the leases were negotiated more than 20 years ago and no longer produce revenue in keeping with the properties’ market value.

The supervisor said that in Dana Point Harbor, for example, more than 100 boat slips are vacant, yet there is a waiting list of boat owners for slip space. In those cases, however, the available slips do not match the size of boats on the waiting list.

“Some of the terms in the leases are outdated,” Riley told the board. “They are not now beneficial to the county and do not relate to the business practices the county employs in recently negotiated leases.”

Meanwhile, Stanton’s plan for analyzing costs of providing legal representation for indigents called for a review of eligibility and collections procedures.

“We must intensify our efforts to control expenses given the current financial constraints that now face the county,” Stanton said. “In striving to lower costs, we must recognize that any acceptable plan must provide reasonable assurance that the individual rights of all indigent defendants are protected.”