O.C. Services Sliced About 50%, Work Force 12% in New Budget : Recovery: Board OKs last-minute measures asked by Popejoy to create $19-million reserve fund. Sheriff, D.A. feel effects. Vasquez says expectations of citizens must change.

Slashing government even more severely than had previously been considered, Orange County’s Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a budget Thursday that will slice county services nearly in half, chop the work force by about 12% and trim the salaries of the county’s highest-paid employees.

Although the supervisors had already approved roughly $188 million in reductions to the county’s ongoing operations, county Chief Executive Officer William J. Popejoy asked for an additional $19 million in last-minute budget adjustments to create an emergency reserve fund.

The latest changes were given to department heads for the first time Wednesday, and the supervisors saw them on paper only five minutes before meeting to discuss them.

In presenting his latest budget, Popejoy announced a new policy banning employees from taking the county’s 2,000-plus cars home after work without express permission.

He also presented plans to study more huge cuts, including those that would result from consolidating the Sheriff-Coroner’s Department and marshal’s office, and eliminating the county library system.

“The process has been painful and difficult. We will be a different county. The expectations of the citizens of this county will have to change,” Board Chairman Gaddi H. Vasquez said during a daylong hearing on the latest round of cuts. “Today is an extraordinarily difficult day. It is unfortunate that it has to come to this.”

The revised budget presented Thursday restores some of the most controversial cuts Popejoy originally proposed, keeping open the Joplin Youth Center and the Bowerman landfill, and reducing somewhat the massive number of layoffs that had been planned in the Social Services Agency.

But it also makes large new cuts in law enforcement, something that Sheriff-Coroner Brad Gates and Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi complained Thursday would further clog the criminal justice system and lead to an increase in crime throughout the county.

“We’re at a point where you’re going to cut off the legs and cut out the hearts. We say that a lot--but we really mean it here,” said Gates, at times raising his voice and at times choking back tears during an hourlong presentation before the board.

“We absolutely can’t do it and still provide essential public safety services,” he said after the budget was approved. “I’m embarrassed to even be asked to make these kinds of cuts.”

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The new budget--which Popejoy wants to put into effect within days--eliminates 1,590 positions on top of the 433 jobs slashed in January. At the time of Orange County’s Dec. 6 bankruptcy filing, the largest by a government agency in U.S. history, the county had an authorized work force of 17,292 positions.

That 12% reduction in the work force will entail 718 new layoffs--fewer than the 1,040 predicted earlier this month--the elimination of virtually all vacant jobs and a host of voluntary resignations and early retirements.

As of noon Thursday, 127 employees had signed up for the special early retirement offer, but officials expected that number to climb to about 200. Though the deadline was set at 5 p.m., Personnel Director Russ Patton said late Thursday that a final number was not available.

“Today, we come here and face another dark day,” said Nick Berardino of the Orange County Employees Assn., which represents most county workers. “County employees, who have been least responsible for the debacle, are now selected to pay the highest price.”

Under the latest plan, the general fund operating budget is $275 million, down from $462.5 million last year, but only $256 million is available for programs and personnel. That will form the basis for the 1995-96 budget, which must await final approval this summer, once the state completes its budget process.

Popejoy warned again Thursday that the number of layoffs would probably continue to rise.

“These are bitter pills,” Popejoy told the board. “But we’re talking about what is necessary . . . to move the county forward on a plan that allows for a program of survival.”

Though the supervisors had asked Popejoy to restore more than $11 million in nine separate areas from the budget the CEO presented two weeks ago, the plan approved Thursday restored only $1.7 million from the supervisors’ suggestions, virtually all of it to keep Joplin open.

The $19-million reserve fund, presented for the first time Thursday, could be spent only with a four-fifths vote of the supervisors. It is intended as a “cushion” in the event that anticipated revenue falls short, bankruptcy-related expenses run higher than expected or the county is forced to pay higher interest rates to its bondholders this summer.

“We had a budget that was almost devoid of any reserve or contingency, and if there’s anything this county knows, it’s to expect the unexpected,” Popejoy said. “The purpose of this reserve is to anticipate future bumps in the road.”

Combined with $1.76 million already set aside for contingencies, the new fund will be created with new general fund savings from nearly a dozen departments, including $4 million from the sheriff, $3.5 million from the Health Care Agency, $2 million from the district attorney’s office and $3 million from the courts (the court money will be replaced by revenue from the state).

In addition, Popejoy’s proposed salary cuts for about 280 of the county’s highest-paid administrators will add $1.7 million to the pot.

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The salary proposal, which must be approved by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge John E. Ryan, would chop 10% from people who earn more than $120,000 a year, 7.5% from those who make $100,000 to $120,000 and 5% from those who collect $75,000 to $100,000.

Employees that drive county cars or receive auto allowances, two practices Popejoy is ending, can absorb the salary reduction through the loss of those perks.

“These are people who probably make less money than their counterparts” in the private sector, Popejoy acknowledged. “These are real sacrifices that may in many ways damage our effectiveness as a county.”

Gates criticized the salary proposal, which would hit his own pocket.

“If you think this job is overpaid, line up, because in four years you’ll have a chance to take it,” Gates said, explaining later that he plans to run for reelection but invites any challengers. “I work hard for my salary. I believe I’m grossly underpaid.”

Earlier this month, Supervisor William G. Steiner took a 10% pay cut as part of his office’s shrunken budget. Supervisors Vasquez and Roger R. Stanton have previously vowed to reduce their salaries by 5%, which they would be required to do now under Popejoy’s proposal.

The most emotional part of the day came as Capizzi and Gates--both independently elected officials who led the crisis-management team immediately after the county went bankrupt in December--stood at the podium presenting lists of programs that would be cut if the new budget were approved.

Gates, a 20-year veteran, showed a short video of a food fight at the jail and a car stop in which a bank robbery suspect shot at officers, to depict the dangers his deputies face.

“My employees have to strap on a gun to go to work every day. They have to put on a flak vest to make sure they get home safely. How many of the people in this room . . . how many elected officials in this community . . . would like that job? I’ll give it to you tomorrow,” Gates said.

“And by the way,” he added, “I won’t give you any training because I have no money for that. I’ll just give you a badge and a gun and tell you to get in that car.”

Gates said the cuts would probably lead to the closure of parts of the crime lab, a slowdown in the coroner’s office response to crimes, cutbacks in the gang unit and a reduction in jail beds.

Capizzi echoed Gates’ pleas, saying the new cuts to his department would force elimination of 30 to 40 vacant positions and the end to several programs, including:

* Special attorneys designated to work on arson cases, elderly abuse and child abuse.

* Certification of law students to act as advocates in traffic court.

* Fighting appeals of traffic court cases.

* Prosecution of city and county ordinance violations.

“We cannot continue to provide the services that we are providing in the prosecution of criminals with a $2-million cut or even a $1-million cut,” Capizzi said. “It’s going to effectively . . . cripple our ability to prosecute cases in Orange County.”

The supervisors, who for months have vowed to keep public safety as their top priority in slashing the budget, did not bow to the pressure.

“I don’t like to see what’s being done, but in a word, we’re broke,” Supervisor Marian Bergeson told Gates. “I just don’t see a way out.”

She added later: “All of us have recognized that we’re brutalizing essential services. They’re Draconian cuts, but, frankly, I don’t know where else we can go. It’s just not business as usual and everyone in this county has to understand that.”

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Although $6.2 million in new state revenue has been restored to the Social Services Agency from the plan Popejoy presented earlier this month, that department still faces the largest number of layoffs, leading several employees to the podium with dire warnings Thursday.

“It is now only a matter of time before children start dying,” social worker Gary Govett said. “You have an opportunity to provide a lifeboat for children who would otherwise drown in abuse.”

John Gonzalez, one of Govett’s colleagues, went a step further, warning the five supervisors that “we can expect some child deaths” that the Social Services Agency will be accused of failing to prevent.

“We must not regress in eliminating and preventing child death,” Gonzalez pleaded from the podium. “I understand that this county is in a financial crisis. But a child’s life must never be permitted to go bankrupt. This Board of Supervisors must not become accomplices to child abuse.”

Steiner, the board’s leading advocate for social services, shook his head and said that while he was not happy with the plan, he saw no alternative.

“This takes a very, very desperate situation for children and makes it somewhat better. It’s not a perfect world,” he sighed. “The most essential services . . . especially children’s services, can be saved with this. While I would have liked to have gotten much more, the art of public policy is compromise.”

Building a Reserve

In addition to reducing the 1995-96 Orange County budget to $275 million, Chief Executive Officer William J. Popejoy asked for a $19-million emergency reserve from budget cuts adn new revenue:

Department reductions

Sheriff-coroner: $4 million

Health Care Agency: $3.5 million

District attorney: $2 million

Limit professional fees: $2 million

Other sources

Higher state funding: $3 million

Salary Reductions

Sliding scale salary reductions will contribute $1.7 million to the reserve. How the cuts will work:

Salary Cut $75,000-$100,000 5% $100,000-120,000 7.5% $120,000 and more 10%

“I cannot accept the $4-million reduction. We’re at a point where you’re going to cut off the legs and cut out the hearts. We say that a lot. But we really mean it here.”--Sheriff Brad Gates

Source: County chief executive’s office