Fees for Sheriff Services at Issue

Looking for revenue to offset state budget cuts, Riverside County officials voted Tuesday to look into whether the Sheriff’s Department was undercharging cities for providing law enforcement.

Supervisor John F. Tavaglione questioned why cities aren’t charged for 15 services -- such as the use of aviation, crime analysis and forensic units -- that they would have to pay for if they had their own police departments.

“Why should we be subsidizing certain cities?” he said. “Let’s get moving on it, because right now we’re hurting. And we’re going to be hurting worse.”

The move comes after Los Angeles County officials questioned whether their sheriff substantially undercharges his contract cities. Cities and counties across the state are trying to boost their revenue, uncertain of how the state budget will affect them.

The issue was raised Tuesday when the board discussed a contract to provide sheriff’s deputies to the city of San Jacinto. The contract, with a motion to order the county’s executive office to look into the compensation issue and report to the Board of Supervisors within 60 days, was approved on a 5-0 vote.

The county’s contracts with 12 cities bring in $80 million annually, a little more than half the patrol budget of the Sheriff’s Department. The San Jacinto contract would add $4 million.

In 1973, lawmakers in Sacramento were persuaded to limit overhead costs that counties could charge cities. Additionally, Sheriff-Coroner Bob Doyle thinks such charges are bad procedure.

“I don’t think it’s good public policy when you start nitpicking and charging for every little thing you do,” he said. “You start losing focus on what the mission is. The mission is the safety of citizens, all citizens.”

Supervisor Jim Venable was concerned that deputies would be shifted from unincorporated areas to cities: “The unincorporated citizens are the ones who are going to be suffering.”

That concern is not unfounded. Doyle said that while the ratio of deputies to citizens was 1 per 1,000 last year, it has slipped to 0.85 per 1,000.

Contract cities are guaranteed a level of staffing by their contracts, he said, but unincorporated areas are not. He said the decline in the ratio of deputies to citizens was due to board orders earlier this year to cut the department’s budget by 1.5% and to freeze hiring.

“You can’t have your cake and eat it too,” Doyle said. “You can’t tell us to cut 1.5%, put a hiring freeze on us and complain there’s no deputies. What do you want us to do?” He has suggested a public-safety fee on every new home to help deal with all county’s new residents.

These discussions may intensify in coming months, as the county prepares its budget for the upcoming fiscal year. The board has already told department heads to prepare spending proposals with an 8% cut. The proposed budget will be released in mid-June.