By Josh Dulaney, Staff Writer
Posted: 01/10/2010 07:44:12 PM PST
FONTANA – The city faces an $8.2 million budget shortfall for fiscal 2010-11.
City Manager Ken Hunt announced the figure at a goal-setting workshop attended by department heads and elected officials on Friday. “Things have changed, things have gotten worse,” Hunt said.
Hunt reminded officials that the city last year closed a $7 million deficit by eliminating some job vacancies, trimming department budgets, offering early retirement incentives and cutting roughly 50 positions.
But the sour economy and state takeaways continue to chew into local budgets, and the city won’t emerge unscathed.
While revenues are at $79 million, the forecast for sales tax revenue has been reduced by $2 million, Hunt said.
The budget gap consists mainly of a $3 million structural deficit, $1.5 million tied up in road improvements and roughly $2.6 million dedicated next year to contractual employee cost adjustments.
Interest adjustments and added service costs are among other factors digging the hole.
“We haven’t settled on how we are going to balance the budget,” Hunt said after the meeting. “It’s going to have to be a combination of (cutting operating expenses), use of reserves and I guess layoffs are a last resort.”
Hunt said he would meet with bargaining groups next week to discuss the cost adjustments.
Despite the down economy, officials remained hopeful that new projects could get off the ground this year as others wrap up.
Mayor Mark Nuaimi touted the Cypress Avenue overcrossing at the 10 Freeway and the Senior Community Center as projects to be completed this year.
He said construction may start this year on the long-anticipated interchange at Duncan Canyon Road and the 15 Freeway, if the state doesn’t reach for local redevelopment funds.
Councilman John Roberts said such unknowns would cause the city to be relatively conservative in the way it budgets this year.
“We haven’t been able to digest what the governor’s budget means to us and how it’s going to play in our budget process,” Roberts said.
Hunt said he would put together a budget strategy to discuss with the City Council and that he hopes officials would implement the strategy as part of the mid-year budget adjustment in February.
“It doesn’t make any sense to wait until June 30 to try and fix the problem,” Hunt said at the workshop. “It (makes sense) to address it sooner than later.”
To read entire story, click here.
I have some sound financial advice for Fontana City Manager Ken Hunt and Mayor Mark Nuaimi on how they can help close the severe budget gap and place more police officers on the streets simultaneously. The Fontana Police Department has its own SWAT team. It is called S.E.D. or the Special Enforcement Detail. The SWAT team does not have its own budget, and is a part-time SWAT team; much like the military reserve, or National Guard. All members of the SWAT team work other police assignments, unless there is a SWAT call-out to which they are summoned.
Since SWAT team members are required to train numerous hours a month, and are sent to a variety of training classes; some for days, or weeks at a time, they are pulled from their normal duties such as patrol or detectives. This is done as the department would have to pay them overtime in addition to their normal work schedule if they did not. For a police department that is at or above 1 officer per thousand in population, pulling 25 + personnel from their normal duties to serve in this capacity drops police service well below 1 officer per thousand. On paper it looks alright. In reality they are not there. Those not on the SWAT team are burdened with having to pick up the extra load in their absence. With less personnel, this increases response times, and adds to the stress and danger of officers not assigned to SWAT. With SWAT members in training, and other officers injured or sick at the same time, the department generally ends up paying overtime anyway, as they are forced to call in additional officers on their time off to meet minimum staffing requirements. This is just fiscally irresponsible.
What makes having a SWAT team all the more asinine is that Fontana has not had an actual hostage SWAT call-out in years. Most of their true function is serving search warrants, which could be done by their own members of the MET Team. (Multiple Enforcement Team).
The hundreds of thousands of dollars wasted on equipment, maintenance, training and the like annually could all disappear with 1 phone call to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department SWAT team. They could be called, and are obligated by law to respond, just as their bomb squad responds when requested. The Fontana Police Department has utilized the Sheriff’s Bomb Squad several times more than its own SWAT team in hostage situations. This would not only save millions of dollars over the coming years, it would also ensure that when a SWAT team arrives, they are actually more experienced to handle that rare hostage situation; where more than half of Fontana’s SWAT team and hostage negotiations team would be experiencing such a call out for the first time.
This is not only sound fiscal advice, it would place more officers on the street, and factually place more than 1 officer per thousand in population in the work force. Not just on paper. Chiefs of Police love having their own SWAT teams, as they are generally their hand picked favorites of the department, and they enjoy a loyalty from them that may not otherwise receive. SWAT members have a vested interest in keeping the team together also, as they find favor in promotions, special assignments, and also in citizen complaints made against them. It’s a simple case of one hand washing the other, and you are all paying for it. For now anyway.
Carol Dean has made valid point in proper fiscal management. Other waste that accompanies small police department’s having their own S.W.A.T. units are accompanying hostage negotiation teams, their pay, training and expenses, utilizing police dogs, and patrol units to cover perimeters and additional dispatcher personnel needed to cover separate radio traffic.
In 2008, L.A.P.D. Officer Randal Simmons became the first S.W.A.T. officer killed in the S.W.A.T. unit’s 40 year history. That is 1 too many, but contrary to popular belief, being on a S.W.A.T. unit is no where near being the most dangerous assignment in law enforcement. A small department having its own S.W.A.T. unit just to have one is fiscally irresponsible.