The Antelope Valley Times

Your community. Your issues. Your news.

Sheriff’s Department booked a $22.2 million budget surplus in 2021

by •

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department closed the fiscal year ended June 30, 2021, with a $22.2 million surplus, despite exceeding its budget for overtime by more than $50 million, according to a report to the Board of Supervisors Tuesday. [View it here.]

It was the first time the department closed the year without a deficit since the 2016-17 fiscal year, and it did so even after repaying a $63.4 million loan provided by the county to cover an earlier deficit.

The report by county Chief Executive Officer Fesia Davenport on the sheriff’s department’s $3.6 billion budget was received and filed along with a host of other agenda items without any comment by members of the board. The result was a surprise given that the board was told in June to expect a deficit from the department.

Sheriff Alex Villanueva and his management team’s success in cutting overtime by nearly $100 million from prior year levels was the primary driver of the surplus, according to Davenport. Yet overtime still totaled $180.4 million, an overrun of more than $50 million or nearly 40%.

Davenport said other measures taken by the department to reduce spending were one-time in nature and could not be duplicated in future years to keep the budget in balance. Some of the overtime savings, for example, were the result of the pandemic shutdown and temporary reassignments that would not have been possible to implement during normal operations. Courts were shuttered for some time, the jail population was dramatically reduced, and large public events requiring security were non-existent during parts of the 2020-21 fiscal year.

Even though the county has lifted a hard hiring freeze for other departments, it plans to maintain that freeze and other spending controls for the sheriff’s department. That includes holding back $143.7 million in provisional funding outside of the department’s immediate control.

“It is recommended that these controls remain in place until such a time that LASD stabilizes its budget and implements a sound sustainable budget deficit mitigation plan,” Davenport wrote in her letter to the board.

The board and Villanueva have been at odds almost from when he took office. Shortly after he was sworn in as sheriff in December 2018, it was discovered that Villanueva had rehired a deputy fired for misconduct. Since then, Villanueva has repeatedly pushed back against the board’s authority — which is limited when it comes to an elected official like the sheriff — and chosen to make his case to the public rather than the supervisors. Disagreements over his handling of deputy discipline, internal clichés or gangs, vaccine mandates, and most recently, vaccine testing, have been a nearly constant source of friction and have sometimes resulted in legal claims and counterclaims.

The budget is one of the few levers of control the board has over the sheriff. The department has identified a number of funding shortfalls, even as some advocates call for cuts to sheriff’s services in order to fund alternative, community-based programs. As of June 29, 2021, the department had 17,095 budgeted positions, including 10,320 sworn staff. Of those, 16,327 were filled.

The department has funding for four academy classes this year with 87 recruits per class, but says it needs to hire and train more deputies to address open positions, turnover and long-term leave. State funding for trial court security and custody for inmates awaiting transfer to state prison doesn’t cover the actual cost of those services, according to the department.

That claim is backed up by the county’s auditor-controller, who calculates the cost of “prisoner maintenance” at $162.82 per day while California reimburses the county at the rate of $93.54 per day. During an earlier moratorium on transfers, the number of inmates awaiting transport to prison totaled more than 3,900 at its peak.

In what could be a more highly contested issue, the department is also seeking more money to hire additional jail staff, pointing to an increase in the jail population and the need for a higher level of care to comply with various legal settlements. The board is committed to a “Care First, Jails Last” policy that relies on diversion and decreasing the pretrial jail population over time.

The sheriff’s department is also looking for more funding to cover services related to rising crime rates, increasing homelessness and the fight against illegal cannabis production and sale. The CEO has been working with sheriff’s department management for years to find solutions to structural deficits, but Davenport says she has yet to receive a mitigation plan first requested by the board in 2019.

“The mitigation plan should ensure funding priority is given to statutorily mandated or `core mission’ services and include, at a minimum, budget-balancing reduction proposals that are in alignment with the county’s strategic plan (and) goals,” Davenport wrote.

That includes eliminating duplicative or underperforming programs, streamlining divisions, units and services to find efficiencies and reducing layers of management and administration, in addition to ensuring full cost recovery for services provided to the state or contract cities, she said.

While this report has been postponed multiple times and was put on the agenda for one of the last meetings of the year without any formal presentation or discussion, Davenport indicated it would be her last such report to the board unless a new request was made.

–

29 comments for "Sheriff’s Department booked a $22.2 million budget surplus in 2021"

  1. Somehow, someway, immigrants to this country, legal and undocumented, make a living even with obstacles in their way, yet American born citizens whine and complain constantly that life is tough, taxes too high, yada, yada, yada.

    Is is any wonder that in another generation those whiners will be in a distinct minority after not having adjusted to the modern world.

    Now, you’d think they’d be nicer to those immigrants now in hopes they would be nice to them in the future. But, noooooooo.

    I have neighbors from Mexico who are now citizens living the American Dream. He owns a business, their grown kids both went to college and are doing well. They can’t be the only ones.

    Meanwhile, Trumpers whine and want him to fix it for them…a problem he can never fix. He is in deep doodoo all of his own making and they think he can fix the country.

    “Maybe “they’re” just like my mother. She’s never satisfied.” Prince from When Doves Cry.

    How do you satisfy people that can never be satisfied? If you’re already satisfied in life, you can handle anything that comes your way but not for those people. They are a lost cause. He tells them to drink bleach, not wear masks, spread the virus and believe his lies. What can go wrong?

    • What does this nonsensical inaccurate rant have to do with the subject of The Sheriffs budget surplus?

  3. Now if they can get the fire department to shrink their outrageous overtime. The rich get richer cause of overtime.
    Before the haters chime in look up firefighter 1 for Los Angeles County and you will see its not a joke. Most Firemen make way over 200k each year.

    • What’s wrong with people who stand by 24 hours a day just to rush into places where angels fear to tread to save your life and property getting paid 200K a year?

      Here in CA that ain’t exactly a king’s ransom, y’know.

      • Well, they actually aren’t standing by to save my life and property. Like the vast majority of people of ordinary means I live on the flat lands, in a development. Odds of a residential fire involving me in my lifetime are so negligible that I am more likely to need a lightning rod than a fire truck. The regular budget and the overtime budget are driven by the ‘need’ to protect the owners of high value property up in the canyons, not by any interest in protecting me.

          • Yeah, that’s probably a good description of the people who live in the areas that create the high demand for fire protection while universally whining about every penny of tax that comes their way. Well said.

        • They might not be standing by to save your life and property, but living in California most of my life, I have witnessed countless times firefighters have saved lives, and structures. You are too self-centered to see the need we have for these first responders. Firefighters do an amazing job for us all, but not you, Tim. Eric carries a grudge, and so do you.

          • Don’t you sleep? Or do you patrol online 24/7 to punish us?

            We haven’t been lectured like that since……….Alexis went into the fetal position.

          • I don’t have any grudge against firefighters in general. Mike falling out of a helicopter would be cause for a party, but I don’t consider him to be representative of his fellows.

            You are apparently missing the point though.

            Whether the complaint is that the fire department’s bloated budget is a drain on resources or that the poor firemen are having to risk their very lives, the root of the complaint sprouts from the ‘canyon communities’ where a very small percentage of Californians live. They live there, BY CHOICE, and their choice has to be paid for by all the rest of us in tax and by the firemen themselves in blood.

            And if you want to see people howl bloody murder, propose a surtax on properties that require a hundred fold expansion of fire protection in order to pay for that fire protection.

          • Kathy:

            I think that’s Alexis. That’s what it does. Lectures everyone 24/7/365. Don’t pay attention, just ignore “it”. Nobody else can be as righteous as it thinks it is.

          • Let me straighten this nonsense out, America’s whatever. Kathy is right, stop creeping on me. I’m not Alexis, never heard of this Alexis, don’t know what your problem is and don’t care. If you don’t like firefighters or Sheriff’s, then comment.

          • Strange inconsistency. F&F has “never heard of” Alexis, but has followed the comments long enough and closely enough to be quoting deep background on Eric and his “grudge” over “being turned down,” which they claim Eric said themselves.

          • Honestly, you and Mr. America can obsess over my comments all you want. I think Alexis is a pretty name, but I’ve never read a comment using that name, must have been way back. Eric on the other hand mentioned he applied as a firefighter, recently within the last year. I have yet to read a comment from Mr. America about how he feels about this article or firefighters.

          • The only times I open my mouth are to change feet. I had no comment on the subject.

        • Well, Eric, if you believe it to be such a cushy job with such high, unearned, pay, I hear they’re hiring… Why aren’t you applying?

          • Lol, I haven’t applied and I work in a well paid field. My friend applied for LA county about 10 years ago, there was 40,000 people over three days at the Long Beach sports arena to take the test. People came came from all over the world, yes world. You have to ask yourself are they there cause there are no other fire departments. No it’s cause once your in LA county you will become rich. This is not fake news. Go to Transparent California and look up the salaries yourself. Please sit down as you view the salaries.