10:00 PM PST on Sunday, November 29, 2009

The Press-Enterprise

Riverside County’s growing budget shortfall requires strict fiscal discipline, regardless of political pressure. Supervisors will not only need to maintain this year’s cost-cutting steps, but add new ones to avert financial peril in coming years. And every county department will have to contribute to the savings.

The county’s budget workshop last week painted a grim picture of county finances. The county cut programs, positions and pay, and still needed $50.6 million in reserves to balance the budget — essentially creating an ongoing deficit.

That built-in shortfall has since grown to nearly $71 million, leaving the next budget facing a substantial challenge. And the county cannot continue using reserves to cover deficits without risking fiscal disaster. The local economic recovery is likely to be long and slow, meaning years of tight budgets ahead. The state also faces enormous budget deficits for the foreseeable future — and state financial woes have a history of landing heavily on local government.

So supervisors need to be even more hard-nosed about containing costs next fiscal year than they were this fiscal year. The county generally imposed a 10 percent cut on departments this year, but County Finance Director Paul McDonnell last week said county operations would need to cut an additional 5 percent of spending for 2010-11.

That mandate will mean continued efforts to reduce personnel costs, whether through layoffs, unpaid furloughs or other salary concessions. And the county will need to start confronting the growing long-term costs of retirement benefits, as well. Employees are a primary expense of any local government, and the county’s workers need to cooperate on ways to save money. Even then, supervisors said last week that some layoffs would probably be necessary.

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