Government Have-Nots Covet State Surplus

Usually, Lake County can’t afford to keep metal detectors in its courthouse. So after authorities put one outside a notorious murder trial recently, they got chills when it scared some people away.

“What does that tell you?” asked Adam Ayala, the court administrator. “I’m sure some people are packing heat.”

Safety is not only a worry in the courthouse. The sheriff in this rustic resort community north of Napa Valley struggles to keep cops on the street too.

Deputies get just $12 an hour. And there’s no guarantee of some basic protections like bulletproof vests or backup officers in emergencies. Turnover is so high the average deputy has been on the job for only three years.

It’s one thing to struggle through a patch of hard times, said Sheriff Rod Mitchell, but life-and-death risks are intolerable when the state is counting its third multibillion-dollar budget surplus in a row.

“It is almost criminal when we have to hope for grants to buy body armor and flashlights and those people in Sacramento are spending surplus money on bike lanes for somebody’s district,” Mitchell fumed.

Local governments throughout the state still suffer crisis-level hardship even as the surging California economy has showered state government with almost $10 billion in unexpected cash since 1997--more than $4 billion of it this year.

The situation is a legacy of the Proposition 13 tax revolt in 1978, officials say: Ever since local government lost the ability to raise property taxes without limitation, it is far more dependent on stingy state lawmakers.

This year, the Legislature appears to have the resources and political will to help. Republicans and Democrats have sponsored major bailout plans, some that lock in a substantial long-term shift of money from the state to local governments.

“This is the do-or-die year,” Sen. Jim Brulte (R-Rancho Cucamonga) told a group of city officials last week.

There is just one hurdle--Gov. Gray Davis.

In his campaign last year, Davis promised to return money to local governments that he considered “stolen” by the state. But even with this year’s surplus, the only local money Davis has offered is so restricted that city and county leaders say it won’t solve their problems.

Davis’ aides are silent on the matter, but lawmakers and local officials believe the momentum is so strong the governor will be convinced--or forced--to change his plans.

If so, years of tension between state and local governments could begin to erode. While local officials criticize the state, many Sacramento lawmakers complain that cities and counties are irresponsible with their money.

To sort out the problems, the state library’s California Research Bureau issued a report in February that attempts a street-level view of the issue by profiling conditions in eight counties.

The report found that each county is struggling to meet basic needs--in sharp contrast with the financial good times the state is enjoying.

The county hardships span every program in local government, from welfare and health care delivery to roads, parks, libraries, jails and services provided by sheriffs, district attorneys, courts and public defenders.

Many are insidious, recognizable to the public only over time: the grass that grows long in unmaintained parks, bigger crowds in emergency rooms, the larger number of homeless people because of the closure of mental health facilities.

Often the deferred attention has hidden costs.

Resurfacing a road every 15 to 20 years, for example, can make it last for decades. But after maintenance falls behind, the road quickly deteriorates.

“It’ll cost you 10 times more if you don’t do it at the right time,” said David Barnhart, transportation director for Riverside County.

Riverside is one place that is losing the battle to maintain its roads. Instead of a 20-year resurfacing cycle, it has sometimes fallen to a 150-year pace.

Some residential streets have been dropped from the maintenance cycle altogether and will eventually crumble into gravel paths if they are not saved with new cash, Barnhart said.

Today, Riverside’s maintenance priority is the high-speed roads where potholes can be a significant safety hazard. Still, it recently settled a $1-million lawsuit with a motorist whose car went off the road after hitting a bump.

Davis proposed this year to solve problems like Riverside’s by putting $425 million of the state surplus into an infrastructure bank for local government projects.

But the bank would provide only loans that must be repaid. And Davis would require that every $1 lent by the state be matched with $4 from the local government.

For Riverside County, that’s unrealistic, Barnhart said. Riverside could not generate the $4 match and it couldn’t repay the loan. “That just borrows against the future,” he said.

Davis is using much of the new surplus to invest in the state’s future. He wants to build the emergency reserve to an unprecedented $1 billion. He has set aside money for state worker pay raises, for tax cuts and for possible litigation costs.

What has angered local government leaders is that he’s saving money for the state when he hasn’t paid back money he considers taken from cities and counties in the recession years of 1992 and 1993.

Back then, the state increased local governments’ share of public school costs by about $3 billion, thereby lowering the state’s burden by about the same amount. Today, most local governments are still recovering from those budget shifts.

The state library’s report found that five of the eight counties it studied were still spending less in 1997, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1992. At the same time, population growth during the period has increased demand for many of their services.

Some of the most striking findings describe a rickety public safety system even after years of tough anti-crime posturing by politicians at all levels of government.

Many of the counties told state researchers they now handle only the most serious criminal cases. There just aren’t enough detectives, prosecutors, courtrooms or jail cells for much else, they say.

Overworked sheriff’s crime labs can take weeks to analyze a gun residue sample, and many don’t have the equipment for cutting-edge techniques like DNA testing.

Just finding space to hold a trial in Merced and Lake counties has forced authorities to use makeshift trailers with bad heating systems or government hearing rooms. Witnesses, victims, defendants and jurors are forced into hallways in such close proximity that authorities fear violence will erupt or a trial will be jeopardized.

Statewide, public safety has been especially stretched because budget cuts at the beginning of the decade were quickly followed by tougher sentences, particularly the three-strikes law that requires a life term for a third felony conviction.

Alameda County claims the state’s highest workload for its prosecutors, with more than 100 cases each.

Attorneys are rotated on and off the most demanding jobs to avoid burnout. And still the office does not have enough prosecutors to join some special law enforcement units targeting gangs, drugs and sexual predators.

“I guess what you sort of do in this business is a kind of triage,” said Alameda County Dist. Atty. Thomas J. Orloff.

Much of the anti-crime money that is available from the state has restrictions that determine the focus of local prosecutors.

In Riverside County, the district attorney has a $1-million state grant to prosecute insurance fraud and another for special homicides. But there is little extra for prosecutors to properly attack a methamphetamine caseload that has grown 500% in the last 10 years. And the county has cut special units for environmental crimes and consumer fraud.

There are virtually no special grants for counties to defend those accused of crimes.

In Los Angeles County, that means public defenders work with about half the budget of the district attorney. A Los Angeles public defender could handle 1,400 misdemeanor cases a year or up to 250 felonies, said Robert Kalunian, the county’s assistant public defender.

“We are in worse shape than we were in 1992,” he said. “We are basically just trying to keep our heads above water.”

Those who are processed through the courts also could be released from jail early because there aren’t enough cells to hold them.

Five of the eight counties profiled by the state are under federal court orders to relieve overcrowded conditions in their jails. As a result, they release hundreds of inmates before their sentences are completed.

Increasingly, overcrowded state prisons are forcing counties to hold convicted criminals longer before they are transferred to a state facility.

Perhaps the best illustration of the desperate budget condition in recent years is that some counties--such as Los Angeles, Merced and Riverside--have each been forced to close jail facilities even when they are over-filled because they can’t pay the guards to keep them open.

“We don’t ask for the world,” said Mitchell, the Lake County sheriff. “We just need what the public expects--basic levels of protection. This is just an incredibly frustrating experience.”