Supes Target Malibu And Other Small Cities To Pay For Sheriff Overruns
Written by 991KBU on October 2, 2019
Malibu and other small cities that hire the L-A County Sheriff’s Department to be their city police force may soon start paying more for their contracts.
A lot more.
That’s one upshot from yesterday’s showdown between the L A County Board of Supervisors … and sheriff Alex Villanueva.
The countywide sheriff’s budget is bleeding red ink … they are 63 million dollars over budget and growing.
Yesterday … the supervisors put Villanueva’s department on an unprecedented budget lockdown.
No new spending on anything other than hiring law enforcement deputies … civilian support employees … and deputy training.
It was actually a fairly cordial meeting yesterday … given the contentious battles between Villanueva and the county supervisors over the budget and other reforms.
Remember … Villanueva has opened a criminal probe into the supervisors’ inspector general .. and the supervisors have sued the sheriff.
Villanueva opened by saying he has been meeting with supervisors one on one to go over the sea of red ink in his budget books.
NEWSCART 75292 LASO VILLANUEVA AAAA QQQ WITH YOU YESTERDAY
“I want to thank supervisor Kuehl, Hann and Barber for the opportunity to meet individually with you yesterday …”
But then … the gloves came off.
County budget officer Lisa Wickham told Villanueva that he was personally responsible for not overspending … and she told the supervisors it was their job to call him on it.
NEWSCART 75295 LASO LISA WICKHAM
“The California Constitution, the county charter, county code, state law, you are the stewards of the budget.
“Other law mandates that for department heads who go beyond what is appropriate and spend more, there is the possibility that they could be facing personal liability.”
And Villanueva laid the gigantic budget problems at the feet of his predecessor … and by extension the supervisors themselves.
He nicely accused them of chronically underfunding his agency … which has a 3 point 9 billion dollar budget this year.
NEWSCART 75293 LASO VILLANUEVA BRAVO QQ UNDER FUNDED AS WELL
“We are currently the most understaffed law enforcement agency in the entire United States.
“With 816 sworn vacancies and a per capita deputy to resident ratio of 0.9 deputies for every one thousand deputies … which is 2-1/2 tiles less than the national average of is 2.5.”
“We inherited a budget deficit of 47 million dollars from my predecessor … coupled with structural deficits in trial court funding, sworn vacancies, retiree health care, retiree health care, workers compensation and unfunded mandates leaves us severely underfunded as well.”
And that point … Villanueva has support form the supervisors.
Despite freezing his budget … they told the sheriff they would hire an auditor to examine where the sheriff can get additional money.
And Malibu is one place.
Malibu and the other 40 small cities in L A County that contract with the sheriff to be the local police force.
County supervisor Janice Hahn …. from San Pedro.
NEWSCART 75294 LASO HAHN QQ SHOULD BE GETTING FROM THEM
“Apparently we’re not getting the money that we should be getting from out contract cities.
“And that is something that we have talked about … need to really be drilling down … in terms of these contract cities Who are involved in the contract … to see that we really are getting the money that we really should be getting from them.”
And supervisor Hilda Solis said her constituents in unincorporated areas like East Los Angeles were paying to hire deputies in surrounding cities.
She doesn’t like that.
NEWSCART 75291 LASO SOLIS QQQ OUT IN THE CONTRACT CITIES
“I’ve had several different experiences in the East LA area where some of my own constituents there are troubled that not enough deputies deployed in the unincorporated area because they are deployed out to contract cities.”
Malibu spends about 8 million dollars a year … out of the city’s 55 million dollar budget … to hire the sheriff to be the Malibu municipal police.
It is far cheaper and more efficient than setting up a local police force.
But that expense is certain to increase … perhaps dramatically … in coming years.
