Supervisors Seek Ways to Save Money

Searching for ways to save taxpayer dollars, the County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday endorsed expanding inmate labor for custodial services, and suggested auditing the disability retirement system and offering a lower-cost retirement plan to new employees.

Those ideas, culled from budget hearings this year and in the fall of 1992, were at the top of a list of 13 money-saving proposals weighed by the supervisors at their meeting. The supervisors discussed the list to decide which ideas were worth further study.

Supervisor Maria VanderKolk, who originally presented the list to the board, said she strongly backed auditing the disability retirement plan and the county’s system of awarding full pay to firefighters and sheriff’s deputies on long-term disability. “I don’t think there’s a lot of public awareness of how huge that fund is,” she said.

The supervisors also suggested that county administrators study how to shift legal work now given consultants to the county counsel’s staff of lawyers.

Supervisors rejected a number of suggested methods to save money, including proposals to consolidate various county agencies. One plan would have merged parts of the Health Care Agency and Public Social Services Agency. Another would have swept the farm adviser, animal control, agricultural commissioner and solid waste management department under the umbrella of the Resource Management Agency.