County will decide fate of budget March 28
District Attorney John Sarsfield is pointing fingers at the San
Benito County Board of Supervisors over the denied payment of
nearly $20,000 in claims.
County will decide fate of budget March 28
District Attorney John Sarsfield is pointing fingers at the San Benito County Board of Supervisors over the denied payment of nearly $20,000 in claims.
The finance director said the DA’s office is out of money in its services and supplies budget, though they still have money in their overall budget. Sarsfield charged the rejected claims are an attempt by the Board of Supervisors to shut down prosecution of Los Valientes. The Board of Supervisors, however, won’t even discuss the DA’s budget until the March 28 board meeting.
The uproar started March 14 when Sarsfield sent an irate memo to board Chairwoman Pat Loe and sent press releases to local media outlets that funding had been pulled from his office.
Finance Director Joe Paul Gonzalez had returned unpaid claims to the District Attorney’s office March 13 with a memo saying that they could not be paid until the Board of Supervisors had approved a budget augmentation or a transfer of funds.
“Customarily, [a department] knows when they are going to go over its budget,” Gonzalez said. “It should know, or at least the person responsible in the department does.”
It is usual for a department to run out of money for part of their budget for the year, Gonzalez said, but it is rare that they would continue to send in claims when a fund has run out of money.
“Most will be preemptive about it and go before the Board of Supervisors and ask for a budget augmentation,” he said. “They will come before the board and say things need to be paid and ask for authority before we obligate ourselves. That is key.”
Sarsfield’s outrage over the rejected claims comes from a Government Code section (GC 29601) that prohibits the board from pulling funding from the district attorney’s office.
“That one fund is where we run the prosecutions out of,” Sarsfield said. “They don’t have discretion about that. They can’t stop the district attorney’s office.”
The code section seems to be open to interpretation. An administrative services manager for the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s office said while they haven’t had issues with the code, other counties have.
“There have been significant issues in Ventura County,” George Doorley said. “They’ve filed mutual lawsuits over funding.”
In Santa Clara County, Doorley’s responsibilities include making sure that the DA’s office stays under budget. The department presents a financial status report four times a year to discuss projections for the budget and unexpected expenditures.
“Having reported it early allows us to work within the budget,” Doorley said.
The hold-up over payment of more than a dozen claims has shut down prosecution of all cases except driving under the influence and crimes of violence, Sarsfield said.
“I don’t think they have any legal authority to pull the plug,” Sarsfield said. “They took it upon themselves to shut down criminal prosecutions.”
However, the funding for the district attorney’s office has not been pulled. One portion of his budget is in question, the fund used to pay services and supplies.
One of the services that has put the district attorney’s office over its services and supplies budget for the year is outside legal counsel. The district attorney’s office hired Nancy Battel to help with the prosecution of the Los Valientes and Michael Pekin cases. The February claim for Battel’s services totaled more than $13,000.
“We knew we were going to have extraordinary expenses [this year],” Sarsfield said. “Particularly in prosecuting the civil suits. We told the county that for several months.”
The district attorney’s office has a budget of $146,300 for services and supplies for the year and according to Gonzalez, it’s been exceeded by more than $70,000 with four months left in the fiscal year.
“This job has got nothing to do with politics,” Gonzalez said.
Gonzalez rejected payment of claims totaling nearly $20,000 for services and supplies for the district attorney’s office when he ran a monthly budget report for February on March 10. The report is shared with the Board of Supervisors.
The rejected claims include several services that Sarsfield said are integral to the prosecution of local criminals such as subpoena services, blood alcohol analysis and gasoline expenses.
“Rather than transferring or augmenting [the budget], which it is their duty to do,” Sarsfield said. “They pulled the plug again.”
Other rejected claims include office supplies, temporary staffing and Web site support.
“They are refusing to pay phone bills,” Sarsfield said. “They are refusing to pay subpoenas. That is critical … this is completely indefensible and reckless.”
While the department is still within its overall budget, which includes salaries and benefits as well as the services and supplies fund, Susan Thompson, the county administrative officer, said the Board of Supervisors had been concerned that the department would exceed its overall budget before the year finishes.
“There was a lot of concern when we did a mid-year budget analysis,” Thompson said. “They had expenditures in excess of what they should have been in the services and supplies portion.”
Through February, most departments should have expended 55-58 percent of their overall budgets, Gonzalez said. The district attorney’s office has spent 70 percent of its overall budget.
“Had they bothered to tell us we were running low, had they bothered to tell us,” Sarsfield said, “I would have been more than happy to [ask for a transfer of funds.]”
Sarsfield maintained that the finance director never notified him of the rejected claims.
“We found out when we got phone calls from creditors,” Sarsfield said. “We had to go back to the finance director and found a letter dated a week ago that was sent to the County Administrative Office a week ago. They never sent it.”
However, the Pinnacle did receive printed copies of e-mails sent from Thompson March 13 at 2:56 p.m. and from Gonzalez at 3:43 p.m. the same day, explaining that the services and supplies claims could not be paid for February.
“Board of Supervisors and the CAO’s Office has essentially de-funded” his office, Sarsfield wrote in his memo to Supervisor Loe. The same memo stated that the correspondence received said that it was due to the prosecution of Los Valientes and Pekin.
The e-mails from Thompson and Gonzalez did not mention Los Valientes, but Gonzalez’ memo did point out that the services and supplies budget was over because of $100,000 in outside legal counsel.
An e-mail from Thompson to Irene Uribe in the DA’s office explained the possible procedures to help the office end the year without a deficit. Thompson suggested that the DA’s office leave vacancies open and request a transfer from the salaries and benefits fund to the services and supplies fund. The other alternative is asking the board for a budget augmentation, which would provide funds from outside of the DA’s office.
Sarsfield met with Thompson, Loe and county counsel this week to discuss the DA’s budget. The county administrative office is preparing a contigency transfer request that will be voted on by the board March 28. Kellie Kennedy, the management analyst for the office also prepared a services and supplies projection for March through June.
“We are trying to estimate what the need will be to get the department through to the end of the fiscal year,” Thompson said. “We are looking at everything … in this kind of a crisis we look at everything – administrative staff, at ways to forego costs not directly related to prosecution.”
Thompson is still gathering information to present to the board, which will discuss the budget in open session.
Sarsfield also stated that the board is not allowing the department to fund two deputy district attorney positions. The office has already started a search to replace one of the positions, Thompson said. Six applications have been sent to the DA’s office for consideration. The other position has not been vacated yet, but will be open when Denny Wei, another deputy district attorney, leaves the office March 31 for another job.
“That vacancy was not anticipated,” Thompson said.
If the position vacated by Wei is left open temporarily, the savings from salary and benefits could be used to cover the over expenditures in services and supplies, allowing the DA’s office to end the year within budget, Thompson said.
“We are never going to be in the black because the budget is set below for a county with 1,500 cases,” Sarsfield said. “We have 2,500 cases and they keep eliminating our positions and increasing public defenders.”
Budget clashes are an issue in Santa Clara County, as well. The DA’s office there has dealt with budget cuts for the last five years, including a 12 percent cut in funding and the loss of 65 positions.
“We may come in under budget, but we are not budgeted at the level that meets the public safety needs,” Doorley said.
Unlike Santa Clara, the San Benito District Attorney’s office has received budget increases for the last two years.
Since 2002-2003, the San Benito District Attorney’s budget has increased each year.
2003 – 2004 $932,479*
2004 – 2005 $1,037,973*
2005 – 2006 $1,073,533
*Actual expenditures.
