Stability Marks County Budget

Los Angeles County continued its long march toward financial stability Monday by proposing a $14.3-billion budget for the coming year that creates 4,100 new jobs, but caps the number of indigent patients public hospitals would accept from other facilities.

The latter plan immediately came under fire from Supervisor Gloria Molina, who labeled it “dangerous” cost-cutting.

But another potential confrontation was averted when the Sheriff’s Department struck a conciliatory note, even though the budget ignores most of newly elected Sheriff Lee Baca’s pricey requests for new jails and deputies.

The spending plan marks the second straight year that the county has not had to slash services and jobs to cover a mammoth deficit in its health department. Instead, the county is hiring 481 new social workers to bring caseloads down in its child welfare agency, expanding mental health services and boosting services to unincorporated areas.

“The atmosphere of crisis and impending doom that characterized the county budget to various degrees over the past several years has certainly lifted,” said Chief Administrative Officer David Janssen.

The proposed budget is expected to be formally adopted by the board today, but the real battles begin next month when public hearings start. The budget will be revised and a final version must be approved sometime this summer, and supervisors Monday predicted a relatively smooth process.

“It’s a budget that’s safe, in the terms that there’s no draconian cuts or large increases,” Supervisor Don Knabe said. “We’re continuing to try to right the ship.”

Even Molina said it was the best budget she has seen in her eight years at the county, saying it is “putting back the services that were downsized years ago.”

Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, while praising the budget, cautioned that it masked a deeper problem: “As long as the economy is doing well and the state is leaving us alone, we can do well from year to year,” he said. “But there is still the matter of the county’s financial structure.”

Mindful of that, Janssen steered clear of dramatic program expansions, warning that the county should not embark on a spending frenzy. His fiscal caution was apparent in his office’s refusal to grant the sheriff’s requests for more than $300 million to reopen five jails and to hire 1,000 more deputies.

The Sheriff’s Department submitted only a handful of pages in its budget request, without prioritizing its items, while other county agencies sent Janssen whole binders of documentation to justify their requests for more funds.

“We simply aren’t going to recommend something to the board that we don’t have backup for,” Janssen said.

Baca toured sheriff’s stations soon after his election, swearing to “raise hell” if he did not get $100 million to expand the deputies’ ranks. On Monday, his department struck a far more conciliatory stance.

The agency gets $57 million more in Janssen’s proposal, and much of that will be used to make up for lost grants or to increase technical service. But Undersheriff Paul Myron said he was pleased.

“We would increase staffing, open a couple stations. It would keep us pretty busy,” Myron said. “And if they do the same again next year, we’ll have the $100 million the sheriff said he wanted. I don’t think he ever expected to get $100 million in one fell swoop.”

Supervisors and other officials said that once Baca elaborates on his requests his budget may be revisited, and Supervisor Mike Antonovich issued a statement saying the current proposal “short-changes public safety.”

An even more intransigent budget problem remains in the health department, which can balance its books only through a nearly $300-million federal waiver, which expires at the end of the upcoming fiscal year.

Even with that aid, Janssen had to take unprecedented actions to close a looming deficit in the department by ending the county’s long-standing commitment to accept indigent patients from other hospitals’ emergency rooms.

Private hospitals are required by law to treat indigent patients who enter through the emergency room, but usually soon transfer the costly patients to the county. Janssen’s proposal would end these transfers and save the county $5 million annually, although the county would continue to accept transfers of indigent patients for whom it could provide superior care, as required by law.

The proposal drew sharp criticism from both Molina, who called it “dangerous,” and the Southern California Healthcare Assn., which represents local hospitals.

“This could have a branching domino effect that could really be damaging for Los Angeles,” said Jim Lott, vice president of that group. “It could put the whole trauma system at risk.”

Lott said private doctors would be hesitant to contract with hospitals for emergency care if they were at risk of being saddled with indigent patients for the long term. That could lead to emergency rooms cutting back dramatically.

“The savings don’t seem to be worth it,” Lott said.

Janssen’s proposal takes the place of a health department plan to cut hospital beds by 10% to close its deficit. The county’s top medical officer, Dr. Donald Thomas, said that in theory Janssen’s plan could work, but “it has technical difficulties that still need to be resolved.”

Yaroslavsky, however, said the proposal should not be dismissed. “The private hospitals can’t use the county hospitals as a dumping ground for patients they don’t want,” he said. “They have to bear their fair share of the burden.”

Another important part of the budget is a sizable expansion of staffing in social service departments.

Not only would the county hire more than 500 new caseworkers for its overworked child welfare agency, but it would also boost its ranks of welfare workers by 931 positions to enroll more families in Medi-Cal and add 694 workers to its Mental Health Department at a time that its treatment of mentally ill inmates is being investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Almost all of those positions would be funded by the federal and state governments, as is most of the county’s budget. Janssen pointed out that of the $2 billion of county-generated money spent by the supervisors, more than half goes to law enforcement.

The proposed budget also lists $30 million to enable the county to wean itself from reliance on a rebate from its employees’ pension fund, continuing a retreat from a move that drew sharp criticism from Wall Street.

Another expansion comes in services to the 1 million people living in the county’s unincorporated areas, who would see modest increases in county programs to clean up graffiti and remove stray dogs, as well as long-delayed upkeep for facilities in places like Bonelli Regional Park and Will Rogers State Beach.

The budget would also fund new fire stations in Agoura, Malibu, Santa Clarita, Valencia and Windsor Hills, and begin the building of four libraries in the northern part of the county.

The county counsel’s office also would get a boost of $11 million and nearly double its staff with 219 new employees, to shift away from its use of a contracting arrangement with its lawyers that has sparked two lawsuits. And the county plans to salt away a $3-million contingency to deal with year 2000 problems, even though its technical staff pledges they will be minimal.

Times staff writer Tina Daunt contributed to this story.

Los Angeles County’s Proposed Budget

The county released its proposed $14.3-billion budget for the fiscal year that runs from July 1999 to June 30, 2000. Most of the county’s budget is actually funded by the state and federal governments. But the Board of Supervisors, which must approve the budget by the end of June, has some discretion over spending. It will take up its budget office’s proposal today. Public hearings begin May 12. Highlights include:

* $2 million to buy land and plan four new libraries in the northern part of the county.

* $500,000 to expand patrols for stray dogs.

* $6.2 million for deferred maintenance on crumbling county buildings and roads.

* $3 million in a contingency fund for last-minute work on the year 2000 computer problem.

* $30 million to wean the county off reliance on earnings of its employees’ pension fund to balance books.

* $17.8 million to build fire stations in Agoura, Malibu, Santa Clarita, Valencia and Windsor Hills.

* $3.8 million to hire 79 employees to increase staffing at juvenile probation camps.

* $3.8 million to expand public health services, including AIDS and alcohol programs.

* $53 million, mostly federal and state money, to hire 931 caseworkers to enroll more people in Medi-Cal.

* $121 million in mostly federal and state money to expand mental health care for jail inmates and children.

* $84 million in mostly federal and state money to hire 481 social workers in the Department of Children and Family Services to bring caseloads down 10%.

* $137 million to refurbish facilities at Will Rogers State Beach, Bonelli Regional Park and elsewhere and for new gyms and community centers.