County Overtime Costs Soaring, Audit Finds

Los Angeles County’s continuing fiscal crisis may have resulted in pink slips for thousands of workers over the last 18 months, but those who kept their jobs have received a pleasant windfall: a huge boost in overtime pay.

Even as Los Angeles County was forecasting another budget deficit of as much as $460 million for the upcoming fiscal year, it paid out 24% more in overtime during the first six months of this year than it did during the same period the year before, according to a Bureau of State Audits report obtained by The Times on Monday.

During the last fiscal year, county overtime spending hit $180.2 million. If this year’s overtime spending continues at its current pace--$106 million in the first six months of the fiscal year--the total will reach at least $212 million, based on the state auditor’s findings.

Since 1993, the county supervisors and chief administrative officer theoretically have required all of the county’s 38 departments to submit requests for overtime authorization. Such oversight supposedly increased last year to include quarterly approval of overtime requests by the chief administrative officer. That came after another state audit concluded that some department heads were ignoring the rules because they were too “cumbersome.”

Despite those efforts, 14 of the county’s 38 departments failed to seek such authorization for the upcoming quarter, according to the state report, which was released to county officials Monday. Among the scofflaws are some of the biggest users of overtime, including the sheriff’s and health services departments, as well as beaches and harbors, the district attorney, the municipal and superior courts and the assessor, state and county officials said.

“Our concern is that with the numbers going up, and then going up again this year, that the county isn’t managing it,” said Steve Hendrickson, an audit manager for the state bureau. “Their own procedures, the pre-authorization--which we think is a good idea--they’re just not doing it like they’re supposed to. It continues to be an issue.”

The state auditor has been monitoring Los Angeles County’s finances since it nearly went bankrupt in the summer of 1995. Oversight by Sacramento was a condition attached to $50 million in bailout funds provided by the state.

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Some critics of current public spending said the disclosures show that the county suffers from a serious inability to manage taxpayer money.

“It’s kind of sad when you think about it,” said Joel Fox, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn. “They recognize a problem, they try to do something about it and it gets worse. What kind of management is that? And guess who pays the bill? The taxpayers.”

County Chief Administrative Officer David Janssen conceded that the overtime situation “is something we have to take a hard look at.”

Janssen said that routine circumvention of the authorization requirements cannot be allowed to continue. “I am concerned that the board adopted an actual ordinance that is not being followed,” he said. “That is a problem.”

Janssen cited a little-known county ordinance adopted in 1993 that required department heads to obtain approval from the supervisors and the chief administrative officer. But state auditors made no reference to that regulation ordinance in their report, saying that the authorization requirement was put in place in March 1996, after they put the county on notice that it was spending too much on overtime.

In their report, state auditors said increasing overtime expenses have played a significant role in the county’s continuing fiscal crisis.

The auditors were particularly critical of the fact that some departments admitted back in November 1996 that they were ignoring the authorization requirement “because they believed it was too cumbersome,” and that they were continuing to ignore it even after being warned not to.

“The county continues to require departments to submit a quarterly request for overtime authorization,” the audit report noted. “However, some departments continue to submit the required requests late or not at all.”

Board of Supervisors Chairman Zev Yaroslavsky has placed a last-minute request on the supervisors’ agenda so he can raise the issue at the weekly meeting today.

In his request, Yaroslavsky--a critic of the board’s lack of control over fiscal issues--said that given the projected deficit for next year, “it is imperative that departmental overtime utilization be properly administered and not abused.”

Yaroslavsky has asked Janssen and county Auditor-Controller Alan Sasaki to prepare reports on the overtime issue by today’s meeting.

Department heads, and even the board of supervisors, have said that some overtime is necessary, especially given all of the staff cuts they have had to make in recent years. Some departments are required by the state to provide set levels of health and safety services, such as the Sheriff’s Department and the Department of Health Services, and they have to resort to overtime to make sure they are in compliance, Janssen said.

Since November 1995, the county has laid off 1,778 permanent employees and 1,126 temporary or contract workers and demoted another 925 employees. The county has also eliminated thousands of unfilled positions.