No Cuts Projected in County Budget

Ventura County officials presented an upbeat but guarded budget projection for the coming year to the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, estimating there will not be a need to cut staffing or services for the first time in years.

“This is generally a positive report in light of the past three years we have had,” said Chief Administrative Officer M.L. Koester.

County budget expert Bert Bigler put it more colorfully.

“In presenting this projection to you, I have mixed emotions,” he said. “On the one hand, because it is a balanced budget, I feel like doing handstands and somersaults.”

But Bigler also cautioned that a variety of factors, including a state Supreme Court decision impacting retirement benefits, were not included in the projection and could affect the 1998-99 budget.

County officials are estimating there will be $512.7 million available for the county’s next general fund budget, including between $10 million and $14 million carried over from the current budget. However, that projection comes before departments develop their own budget estimates.

The general fund makes up about 59% of the county’s overall budget, which also includes special funds for fire protection, roads and libraries, among other things. The current overall budget totals $894 million.

Supervisor Frank Schillo said he wanted to continue with a bench-marking system he had advocated to compare the budgets of county departments to similar departments in other areas. But supervisors Kathy Long and Judy Mikels said they preferred a proposal by the Ventura County Taxpayers Assn. to conduct performance audits of county departments. Board members voted to look into the audit proposal last week.

“Quite frankly, where we need to be is the performance-audit idea,” Mikels said. “One of the fallacies, frankly, of comparing county to county is it doesn’t take into account the private sector.”

Schillo said he also liked the performance-audit idea, and simply wanted some type of measuring stick to judge the county budget.