SLO County Sheriff’s Office needs $4.2 million to cover unbudgeted staffing costs
The San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office is expected to ask the Board of Supervisors Tuesday for $4.2 million the agency says is the result of unbudgeted salary, benefit, and overtime costs..
The sheriff’s budget request — by far the most expensive of any county department — is a consequence of labor agreements signed last year after the current budget was approved, and not the result of a recent 75% increase in deputies patrolling county streets, spokesman Tony Cipolla said Monday.
However, the county’s staff report anticipates nearly $200,000 of the Sheriff’s Office’s expected $2.5 million overtime overage by the fiscal year’s end is a result of COVID-19 impacts.
On Tuesday, the board is scheduled to hear a routine financial status report on the third quarter of this fiscal year, which spanned Jan. 1 through March 31.
According to a staff report, supervisors are expected to hear that overall spending and revenue are, for the most part, consistent with the same quarter last fiscal year.
County staff reports that “because the local impacts and responses to the current COVID-19 pandemic did not start ramping up until the end of the third quarter, budgetary impacts of COVID-19 are likely represented as minimal, if at all, for third quarter actuals.”
The county’s shelter-at-home order went into effect March 19, 12 days before the end of the third quarter.
Roughly a dozen of the county’s 40 departments are requesting some budget adjustment for the final quarter of the fiscal year, which ends June 30.
The Sheriff’s Office is asking for the most additional money — $4,217,041 for “unbudgeted salary and benefit expenditures” — followed by Behavioral Health, which is seeking $1.2 million.
A four-fifths majority of the board is required to approve the budget adjustments.
The staff report says that consistent with prior years, the 2019-20 adopted budget included salary and benefit costs as of November 2018 when the budget was still in development but did not include any negotiated benefit and salary increase that went into effect after November 2018.
The report notes that, based on current staffing levels, the county Auditor-Controller-Treasurer-Tax Collector’s Office expects a total of $10.3 million in negotiated salary and benefits costs above what was budgeted for in the 2019-20 fiscal year adopted budget.
The county says that all departments save for the Sheriff’s Office and the library — which is requesting $210,000 — expect to absorb their unbudgeted wage and benefit increases with expenditure savings or unanticipated revenue.
In a news release April 13, the Sheriff’s Office announced that in response to the county’s shelter-at-home order, the agency increased the number of deputies on patrol in unincorporated parts of the county for the purposes of creating a visual presence on the street to discourage criminal activity.
The increase in patrol deputies represents a 75% boost over normal patrol deployment since the shelter-at-home order went into effect, and the Sheriff’s Office said it “also has the capacity to increase the number of deputies on patrol further if a need arises.”
In response to questions from The Tribune April 17, Cipolla wrote in an email that the increased patrols came after the department reported 32% reduction in calls for service in early April and all major crimes were down some 41%, he said.
All local law enforcement agencies who spoke to The Tribune at the time reported similar significant reductions in calls for service.
Cipolla clarified that the 75% more “boots on the ground” was achieved by taking some deputies off of other assignments and assigning them to patrol. Cipolla wrote that to maximize deployment while not significantly increasing deputies’ hours worked, the department transitioned to a 12-hour shift cycle.
Asked at the time if this would translate to increased cost to the county, Cipolla wrote: ”No, because of the way our schedule was structured, overtime costs were controlled while still providing maximum patrol deployment. We supplemented our patrol staffing with deputies from specialized units to assist with this endeavor.”
Cipolla said the Sheriff’s Office submitted a budget memo for Tuesday’s meeting, as did other departments requesting adjustments, but the document was not posted on the county’s website as of Monday afternoon, and a copy was not immediately available from the county.
The county’s staff report says that the Sheriff’s Office is expected to be $4.7 million over its budgeted level of general fund support at year-end, approximately $1.1 million more than previously anticipated.
The county approved labor contracts with the four unions representing Sheriff’s Office employees last year, after the 2019-20 budget was adopted, costs from which are expected to be a total of $3.6 million in the current fiscal year.
Deputy overtime is projected to be approximately $2.5 million over budget, with $195,646 of that specifically a result of COVID-19 impacts, the county staff report says.
Cipolla said Monday afternoon that Tuesday’s request is due to the salary increases negotiated by the county, but he did not immediately have additional information about the roughly $200,000 from COVID-19 impacts.
Also on Tuesday, the Public Defender’s Office is expected to report an unbudgeted expense of $496,624 due to three capital murder cases it is defending, and the court was anticipating to contribute almost $600,000 to the general fund but will instead require $273,398 in general fund support due to a shortfall in revenues from fines, forfeitures, and other legal fees due to a reduction in court services during the COVID-19 pandemic.
