Volunteers at City Hall May Signal a New Trend : Government: Orange shores up its services with unpaid workers. But critics question the timing and appropriateness of the program.

For eight hours each Thursday, Roy Shebeck works for the city of Orange.

He staffs the mayor’s hot line, dutifully recording public opinion about pressing local issues and logging any complaints. The Orange resident also greets visitors, and serves as an informational resource.

What’s so unusual is the former schoolteacher performs the tasks for free--and inside City Hall.

Volunteers shoring up services at libraries, hospitals and police stations have long been commonplace, but Orange’s introduction of volunteers to City Hall is a new thing--and may signal an emerging trend in Orange County.

“It’s a brand-new thing,” said Dr. Bill Wittich, who teaches a workshop about recruiting and retaining volunteers for Cal State Long Beach’s Graduate Center for Public Policy. “All of a sudden, we are amazed at how many volunteers are being used in city and county government.”

Shrinking budgets and dwindling staffs may soon prompt other communities to follow Orange’s lead in issuing a call for volunteers to help keep City Hall afloat, Wittich said.

La Palma is exploring increasing its skeletal City Hall staff with volunteers, according to city officials. A La Palma council member has signed up for one of Wittich’s fall classes with the idea of attracting volunteers to City Hall.

“We have a big effort going on right now so we can gear up and get some programs going that we have had to put on hold since we didn’t have anyone qualified to do them,” said La Palma’s City Manager Pamela Gibson.

But if officials simply ask for volunteers, will they come?

Yes, says Wittich.

Cities can take advantage of an expanding pool of volunteers, mainly early retirees and high school and college students who are eager to contribute something to their communities.

“We are seeing more people wanting to get involved at the grass-roots level,” Wittich said. “People are realizing if they can get themselves into City Hall and the council chambers, they can make a difference.”

Orange’s volunteer program, which started Sept. 9, puts four full-time volunteers to work each week. And the city has about 25 more ready to be assigned to “special projects” in departments like engineering and planning where the city’s needs are most critical right now.

“People would call up and say, ‘What can I do?’ ” said Jane Owens, a spokeswoman for Orange. “I was amazed at how many people offered their services.”

But the free services Orange is receiving hasn’t come without its costs--at least in terms of public relations. Critics have questioned the timing and appropriateness of the volunteer program.

The city made its appeal for unpaid help this summer shortly after eliminating 73 staff positions in an effort to close a considerable shortfall in a $47-million budget.

“We think (city officials) are way beyond what they should be doing,” said Larry Lykins, a representative of the Orange employees union, whose clerical and classified workers absorbed most of this summer’s layoffs. “The council will do things like (use volunteers) to avoid making the hard choices of either raising taxes or cutting pay to police and fire.”

City Hall volunteers supplanting paid employees is certainly a danger and a powerful temptation for cities strapped for cash, Wittich said.

“The downside of using volunteers is that you replace workers with volunteers,” Wittich said.

Whatever the appearance, Orange city officials deny they let employees go, only to replace them with volunteers months later.

“It’s unfortunate people had to be laid off,” said Mayor Gene Beyer. “But when people want to come forward and help you, you can’t say no. This was not designed with the idea of having volunteers to replace employees.”

However, the city was wary of potential negative reactions when instituting the volunteer program. When adopting a resolution to place volunteers on the city’s workers’ compensation rolls this summer, the measure specifically stated that volunteers shall not be “deemed as replacements of any employee being laid off.”

Beyer admits the volunteers have helped fill gaps in City Hall services created by the personnel cutbacks.

“We had the cutbacks in staff and a lot of that was administrative assistants and secretaries and their absence was putting a lot of pressure on the remaining staff,” said Beyer, who likened the volunteers to the militia being called out. “We needed people to fill those spots and I think (the volunteer program) has been working very well.”

And the volunteers aren’t exactly complaining. Shebeck, 65, a retired social studies teacher and counselor for Los Angeles Unified School District, said he eagerly looks forward to his volunteer job each week.

“I like to keep busy and I’m fairly healthy,” said Shebeck. “If I can do something for my community, I’ll do it. I need to feel appreciated and I get that here.”