Durand Plan Could Deliver Deepest Cuts to Probation

Mental health services and drug-treatment programs for juvenile offenders would be slashed if the county cuts $3.7 million from the Health Care Agency’s budget, according to a memo from agency Director Pierre Durand.

In a memo to Chief Administrator Harry Hufford, Durand proposed wiping out 27 full-time positions that provide mental health and substance-abuse treatment in the county’s Probation Department, including Juvenile Hall and the Juvenile Restitution Project.

The cuts would eliminate treatment for 602 youths but save Durand’s agency about $1.7 million, according to his calculations. That is less than half the money Hufford has told Durand he must cut from his proposed budget in the coming fiscal year.

“If the Probation Department cannot fund this program, the adverse effects . . . will include increased recidivism, truancy, escalating severity of criminal acts” and increased psychiatric hospitalization, Durand’s analysis warned.

Durand could not be reached Wednesday for comment.

Meanwhile, probation officials say they are predicting hard times of their own next year. They expect a new state law that increases penalties for juvenile offenders to increase their costs. At the same time, Hufford is asking county probation to cut $1.2 million from its budget.

Don Krause, a chief deputy probation officer, said he sympathizes with Durand’s position, but the Probation Department can’t afford to fill the void that such cuts would create in teen counseling.

“We’d have to scramble around and hope community groups would take over,” Krause said.

He said he hopes supervisors won’t go along with Durand’s proposal, because, he said, once programs are cut, they can be difficult to start again.

Also, Krause and Hufford said eliminating those jobs very likely would save the county less than $1.7 million because some of the staffing is funded with state money, which would be lost if the jobs are cut.

Hufford already has asked Durand to come up with a revised list that would include another $2 million in cuts, and has accused Durand of trying to stonewall him. Durand is expected to file a new budget-reduction plan by Friday.

Supervisor Frank Schillo said Durand has been resistant to comply with Hufford’s requests. But in this instance, he said, Durand’s proposal is fair, because the Probation Department should have been funding its own mental health programs all along.

“I’m not saying it’s a good idea to cut the services, but it certainly would be one of my candidates for a cut if I were Pierre,” Schillo said. “Why isn’t probation providing this service?”

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Hufford said Durand’s proposal was purely a negotiating tactic.

“At least he’s put something on the table. That’s the good news,” he said. “The bad news is he isn’t being forthcoming. It’s all negotiating. And I’m not going to blink.”

If Durand were serious about the task he is facing, Hufford said, he might propose cutting some of the 27 posts but making other cuts through the county hospital and its clinics, programs contained within Durand’s own department.

Instead, Durand has left the hospital and clinic budgets untouched, and has made no effort to rein in costs or find other revenue for the mental health programs outside the Probation Department, Hufford said.

Durand, a former auditor who has a reputation as a tough fiscal manager, has criticized Hufford for increasing--by $43,900--the administrative fees his office charges the health care agency at the same time he is demanding program and service cuts. The overall fees now run about $500,000 a year.

In response, Hufford snapped: “It’s none of his business. His job is to answer my questions about what’s going on in his budget.”

While Hufford is asking Durand to scale back the Health Care Agency’s proposed budget by 10%, he said he is reducing his own offices’ overall costs by 2.5%, the same reduction he has requested of other smaller county departments, such as animal control and agriculture.

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Hufford, who was hired in January to straighten out the county’s financial troubles, has called for up to $15 million in cuts countywide in an effort to reduce spending and restore the county’s fiscal reputation.

Supervisors have said they support Hufford’s efforts as they head into budget hearings this month. But Hufford’s demands have drawn the ire of department heads, including Durand, Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury and Sheriff Bob Brooks.

Despite the booming economy and rising property tax revenues, the county has in recent years spent more than it has taken in, drawing on its reserves to make up the balance. At the same time, other California counties have been building surpluses.

Much of the county’s financial problems stem from the more than $25 million it has incurred in federal penalties, accounting costs and legal fees for years of overbilling Medicare, and for a failed merger of the county’s mental health and social service departments.