Earlier this week I posted Lauren Ritchie's column part 1 about cutting the Lake County budget. Here is part two, which was published on yesterday while I was in Tallahasse at the Lake County Days. (I will post on this soon...).
There is a lot of meat to Ritchie's suggestions, mainly aiming at dropping lower priority programs (which she defines), and moving some compliance type functions to the Sheriff's department. However, I didn't really see a specific reason why they should be moved to the Sheriff ... being part of an enforcement organization may be useful, but they also may have a much higher benefits overhead. I assume it is because Ritchie may feel that management by the Sheriff may be more effective than that practiced by County Manager Cindy Hall (and the Board). So, the consolidation proposals have merit, but I am not convinced about moving positions to the Sheriff.
Consolidation is always a good move during downcycles, and it is needed periodically by any organization. Most businesses will be pushed into it by competition, but it seems government never thinks about it until there is no cash they can extract from the taxpayer. For instance, just today in the Sentinel, an article described how Disney is finally consolidating engineering and other functions between the west and east coast. Thus, some work functions are being combined between Disneyland in Anaheim, and DisneyWorld in Orlando. You know it is tough when the two parks have to share resources under one manager.
Baselining is another budgeting concept that neither the County or Ritchie talks about (and neither does the School District). That is setting a growth baseline figure for salaries, position counts and overhead like growth in county gdp or inflation, and if that goes down, then salaries, position counts *at each level) and administration as a percent of services is reduced by the same amount. Thus if the total projected revenue for the new budget year is 6% less than last year, employee counts, manager positions, and overhead of central administration is also reduced by that amount. Thus you don't have a situation like HR or other Departments mentioned by Ritchie where you have a Director and only 3 reports, or four managers reporting to the HR Director when the total staff is maybe 7 or 8.
Span of Control is another businesslike factor that the County Commission doesn't seem to understand. Typical span of control for a manager might be defined as 7-9 employees, so why, again, does HR have a Director and four managers for a total group of 7-8? (Based upon my reading of last year's Lee Johnson study...Ritchie doesn't talk at all about the HR department). Ritchie does propose consolidating some departments because they do have a small span of control, which is a businesslike practice.
And, if there is a shortfall, why isn't any of it being passed on to the Constitutional offices?
Maybe we could consolidate elected positions also, and reduce the size of the County Commission by one - any nominations?
PS: I visited the County Commission on Tuesday at their meeting and gave them my rather strong opinion about a few things. I will write that up this weekend.
vj
Below, at the Link is Ritchie's article, part two
orlandosentinel.com/services/newspaper/printedition/wednesday/lake/orl-ritchie1809feb18,0,1724613.column
OrlandoSentinel.com
COMMENTARY
Lake needs to separate must-haves from not-so-much-haves
Lauren Ritchie
COMMENTARY
February 18, 2009
Sunday's column examined the amount staffers predict Lake County government will be short to run its operations for the coming year.
They were looking for ways to find cash to make up the difference between $151.6 million, the amount they expect to take in, and $155.4 million, the figure they say they need to spend to keep running the county.
Their calculations anticipate no raises for county employees; the property-tax rate stays the same; the sheriff, tax collector, property appraiser, clerk of the court and elections supervisor all get the same amount as last year; the county doesn't incur new debt on which it must make payments; and grants to outside agencies are cut in half.
Only one of those suggestions is a spending cut -- reduce "grants" by 50 percent -- and that one would hurt children, poor people who are sick and the mentally ill.
For example, the reduction would hit We Care of Lake County, a nonprofit organization that uses volunteer doctors to treat sick people who have no insurance and are too poor to pay. Last year, We Care provided $1.75 million worth of care. Without We Care, these patients would clog the already overcrowded -- and far more expensive -- emergency rooms to have sinus infections and sprained ankles treated. And who pays for that in the end? You guessed it.
The truth is that the county could cover the entire shortfall and more from an insurance reserve account that its actuary says has an $11 million "surplus."
But using that money is just delaying the inevitable and ignoring the state of the economy.
This shortfall is a divine hint that the county ought to start at its core and divide things into two groups: absolutely necessary and awesome to have. (Here at Column World, we're kindly presuming that nothing falls into the "total waste of money" category.)
Then it ought to start cutting back on the "awesome to have" items until it gets to the sweet point where spending meets revenues.
Sharpen the ol' machete. Here are some items that ought to be considered for reorganization or the chopping block:
*$100,000 allocated this year for a consultant to evaluate the brand-new comprehensive plan and possibly help write the land-development regulations that go with it. The plan was just finished after four years of agonizing work by members of the county's Land Planning Agency and doesn't need a nickel's worth of change, especially not from a bunch of hungry land-planners eager to run up the bill. The same set of land-planning agency members, who are volunteers, are about to embark on writing the regulations. Let them do it. Stop the spending.
*Eliminate the $1.7 million Department of Conservation and Compliance. Hand the code-enforcement division, with its 14 employees, to the Lake County sheriff, who likely could run the operation for less than the $1.2 million the county is spending. (Be sure that investigating environmental complaints remains part of the deal.)
Put an end to the soil and water division, which costs $208,246 annually -- nearly all in salaries -- for three employees. The soil and water division's stated purpose is to "conserve water, prevent soil erosion, convert irrigation systems and inform the public about conservation programs." The Lake County Water Authority does nearly the same thing, and what it doesn't do doesn't need to be done. The water authority could take over the mobile irrigation lab portion of the division, which is paid for by a state grant. That leaves the county without a soil-erosion program. Probably no one will die.
Without a department, no director is needed. The county could eliminate the $159,819, which includes benefits, that it pays to the guy who supervises those 20 employees.
Total minimum savings: $386,065
*Merge the Department of Economic Growth and Redevelopment with the Department of Tourism and Business Relations, and eliminate the salary of one of the two directors. The director of the first supervises three employees; and the second supervises six. The average director salary is $101,500 each, without benefits. Get rid of three vehicles assigned to the tourism divisions.
*Move the division of Animal Services from the Department of Public Safety to the Lake County Sheriff's Office. Animal control employs 30 people, including 13 animal-control officers who work in the field, nine employees at the shelter who care for the animals, three whose full-time job is to euthanize unwanted animals, two dispatchers and a secretary. Sheriff Gary Borders said county inmates -- at no cost to taxpayers -- could take care of the animals, do light maintenance and care for the lawn. It's hard to estimate the exact savings, but it has to be several hundred thousand dollars. Examine why the division has 19 vehicles -- 11 big super-duty pickups -- when it has only 13 field officers.
And are those 30 big trucks in Public Works really necessary? Or will smaller, cheaper-to-operate vehicles do?
*Examine whether 11 people really are needed to run the county's Geographic Information Services division, and, if it comes down to it, whether the county can survive without a GIS system at all. (Hint: It can.) The cost of this division is $910,297 this year, which is down $587,000, or 37 percent, from the previous year because the county finished its aerial-photography project. You, too, can see professionally done pictures of Lake from the air. The data that the division provides is enormously useful and convenient. But when it comes to survival issues, this is like paring a toenail, not chopping off a hand.
*Eliminate all but essential cell phones and direct-connect radios. The county provides a cell phone or radio for one in every 2.4 employees, a total of 362 devices. Are they all vital? That hardly seems possible, given the number of deskbound employees. Each and every one of the county's 420 vehicles should be examined. Certainly, the director of Public Safety should have a vehicle -- he may have to respond to an emergency at any time. But what about the guy who runs the Lake County Fair? Are there daily merry-go-round crises to which he must race?
*And under the category of "Smooching your Own Fanny" comes the Department of Information Outreach. Six people make up the department, whose stated goal is "to enhance the presence and perception of the county through internal and external communication." They run a first-class Web site and produce reports, booklets, press releases and pamphlets, and they have a graphic artist to put it all in an attractive package. The cost to tell you what a wonderful job the county is doing with your money? $354,342 a year. All that, and you don't believe them anyway.
Last week, one of them popped out a news release about a park ranger offering a guided canoeing and kayaking tour starting at Lake Jem Park on Feb. 28.
"Rangers will guide the paddling adventure down the Apopka-Beauclair Canal from Lake Jem discovering the beauty of this area while learning and seeing different plants, birds, and other wildlife," the news release stated.
That is really cool. It sounds educational and fun. But if the choice really is to cut services to the mentally ill or pay someone to paddle around, pointing out various winged wonders, then this county's priorities are all wrong if it chooses the latter.
Do the public-relations folks do a good job? Absolutely. They make my life as a columnist easier -- sometimes they do half my job. But are they necessary for the county's continued existence? You know the answer.
*Lake pays more than $100,000 a year to 15 of its 871 employees that fall under the county commissioners' control. Only eight of the other 1,089 public employees make that much, including five in the office of the clerk of the court, which employs 240 people, and three in the Sheriff's Office, which has 731 employees.
None of the 68 people who work for Tax Collector Bob McKee makes more than $100,000 a year, and he arguably has the most-dedicated and most-talented staff of public servants in the county. That means excellent employees are available at a lower price. The county should ask itself why it needs to pay above the market price to attract them.
County commissioners could start the chop-a-thon by insisting that all those staffers making more than $100,000 annually take a 10 percent pay cut. That savings alone would pay several times over for the grant the county gives Trout Lake Nature Center, which last year hosted 3,681 elementary schoolchildren with the help of volunteers who put in 6,000 hours. The program is integrated with FCAT preparation, so kids learn things that will help them on the test. It's not just a nifty outing.
Could I keep going? Oh, yes, for quite some time. The budget these figures come from is the 35,000-foot view of county government. It contains almost no detail. Examining detailed budgets would be laborious -- but likely would yield more items that most folks would want to eliminate. For example, none of the county's travel is laid out in the basic budget, which is nearly 3 inches thick.
The point of this exercise is simple. Lake County needs to set priorities. The budget in 2004 was roughly $109 million. Five years later, it is $169.6 million, an increase of 56 percent.
Neither the county's population nor the cost of operation increased by 56 percent during that time -- and neither did your family income, I bet. It's just not possible for the county to argue that it is staggering under an unbearable load.
What its leaders can do is stand up like grown-ups, examine the budget and make some hard decisions about what government's role really ought to be -- and how much taxpayers reasonably should be expected to contribute.
Lauren Ritchie can be reached at Lritchie@orlandosentinel.com or 352-742-5918.
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