Cities Taking a Private Approach to Public Jobs : Services: All municipalities in the county contract out at least one job. But the practice, which is seen as a way to save taxpayer money, is hotly contested by local unions and employee associations.

Seal Beach Police Capt. Gary Maiten’s footsteps have a hollow echo as he walks through his city’s jail. Cell doors hang open. Beds lay empty. And the prisoners who should be inside are miles away, costing the city a small fortune.

Shortly after it was built in 1978, the city decided the jail was too expensive to run and started sending prisoners to the Orange County Jail in Santa Ana. At the time, the deal was a money saver.

But when booking fees went up to $158 per inmate two years ago, Maiten began looking for ways to stop using city manpower and money to put petty offenders in a state-of-the-art facility 12 miles away.

His brainchild: Turn the minimum-security jail over to a private company to run. It’s an idea he hopes will earn Seal Beach up to $175,000 a year and put the city on the cutting edge of a government movement that has swept Orange County in the past decade.

After years of shrinking budgets and declining tax revenues, the concept of privatization--contracting private firms to perform city services--has moved from being a government buzzword to a firmly entrenched reality in every city in Orange County.

A Times survey shows that all 31 cities have turned to the private sector to do at least one job traditionally performed by municipal governments.

The transition has saved local governments millions of dollars while giving them increased control over the services they offer residents. And it has produced more efficient city employees, who are giving up benefits and paying more attention to their costs to stay competitive with local businesses.

“I’m so convinced and supportive of the contracting approach, that it becomes harder over time to enunciate a downside,” said Bruce Channing, city manager of Laguna Hills.

But the practice has also come under attack by local unions, who say contractors pay less and offer fewer benefits than the government. As a result, they say, less money goes into local communities and more workers end up on the public dole, costing the government more in the long run.

And though contracting out municipal jobs was once touted as a solution to municipal money woes, cities have discovered its limitations.

“Privatization is not a panacea,” said Tom Wood, the deputy city manager for Anaheim, a city that has grappled with the issue for years. “Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. You have to fine-tune it.”

The concept has long been put into practice in some areas of Orange County. Many of the more recently incorporated cities in the South County area, in fact, were founded with the idea of contracting out as many services as possible to keep city government small.

And county government, which saves an estimated $900 million a year as a result of contracting, has long championed privatization. Further efforts in the area, though, have been hampered by state laws that restrict contracting to 13 specialized areas.

Despite its popularity, the practice remains extremely controversial.

The most cited reason for contracting out to a private company--saving taxpayer money--is hotly contested by local unions and employee associations.

Municipal officials say that, in general, privatizing can shave off 15% to 20% of the cost of a city service.

But such savings are disputed by unions, who say the money supposedly saved by going to a private contractor ends up costing cities more in the long run.

A study by the Service Employees International Union Local 660 in 1991 in Los Angeles found that contract workers make $20 million less than they would if they were employed by the county--money they say went to big corporations and out of the county’s economy.

“It’s not so much a money-saving thing as a wage-shifting thing,” said Bill Folsom, president of the Costa Mesa Employees Assn. “The contractor gets the money and the workers don’t.”

One person who has no need to debate the cost of privatization is Gary Brown.

At 37, he has a 2-year-old child, a wife with an incurable disease and house payments to make on his three-bedroom ranch home in the northwest part of Costa Mesa.

Brown lost his job last year after Costa Mesa turned operation of its golf course over to a private contractor. The city tried to keep him employed at another job working a photocopier, but that, too, fell victim to budget pressures. He was laid off in May.

Last year this time, he was getting paid about $15 an hour with full health and retirement benefits. Now, he makes $9.45 an hour as a fill-in janitor for a local school district and gets no benefits.

His wife, Tamara, has AIDS and the family relies on the state to pay the $467-per-month health insurance plan that covers treatment for her disease.

“It really makes me mad,” Brown said. “They’re bringing in these contractors that hire really cheap labor. We’re going to have a city dwindling down to low-income people.

“I’m starting over again at 37. I had a secure job in the city government. Those years are over with,” he said.

But with cities looking more and more at the bottom line these days, Brown’s story is likely to become increasingly common. Both Costa Mesa and Orange are planning further layoffs this year as a result of privatizing contracts.

“The debate is not whether the work is excellent work, but rather whether a contractor can come in and do it cheaper,” said Scott Morgan, assistant to the city manager in Orange.

Recognizing the appeal of the concept and fearful of its growing popularity, city workers have started battling back recently by beating contractors at their own game.

Anaheim city workers showed last fall that they could carry out a five-year contract for maintenance of four major city buildings for $300,000 less than the $5-million low bid submitted by an outside contractor.

City employees “work fast and they do a good job,” said Gina Beitler, the employee representative for the Anaheim Municipal Employees Assn. “They have done everything they can do to whittle down their costs and work as efficiently as possible.”

One of those sacrifices included giving up a previously negotiated benefit of earning twice their normal pay when working weekends.

But city officials say that no matter what city employees do, there can be no stopping the move toward the private sector, which offers cities not only cost savings, but also an almost surgical control of the city budget.

“If you find that the service is not cost-effective, you change the contract, go to another service or mix and match,” said Sam Olivito, executive director of the California Contract Cities Assn., which counts Lake Forest, Laguna Niguel and Dana Point as members.

“There’s a tremendous amount of flexibility,” he said.

That’s exactly what led the city of San Juan Capistrano to contract out its human relations position to Nibardo Gomez.

Gomez acts as a liaison between the city of 26,000 and the Latino community, about 22% of the population. He moves easily through any one of several predominantly Latino neighborhoods, calling out to people he knows, dispensing advice and taking complaints as he goes.

In one house, accompanied by a code enforcement officer, he asks a young boy in Spanish if he has seen any cockroaches. The boy slowly shakes his head no, but then admits to having seen a few.

The code officer jots down some notes, but pronounces the house free from any serious violations.

The relationship between Gomez and the city’s Latinos has been productive, said Larry Freeman, a code enforcement officer who sometimes accompanies Gomez on his rounds.

“Nibardo really has been instrumental in being a liaison between homeowners, residents and the city and it’s really making things change,” he said.

As an example, Freeman cites the city’s sting in July of illegal truck vendors in a Latino neighborhood known as the Villas. Unlicensed vendors driving trucks filled with vegetables, fruits and cigarettes were littering streets, causing traffic hazards and conducting a noisy, illicit business in the neighborhoods.

So neighborhood association leaders called Gomez, who hammered out a deal in which residents agreed to call the city when they witnessed a violation. The city, in turn, agreed to have health officials and police patrolling the area so they could respond rapidly to reports of wrongdoing.

“We ran off 10 illegal vendors with no business or vendor license,” Freeman said. “In so many communities, they tend to say, ‘The city has a problem, the city should fix it.’ In the Villas, they recognized that they’re a part of the fix.”

For his part, Gomez says his status as an independent contractor allows him to deal creatively with any problems that crop up.

“In my contract, it says the city doesn’t tell me what to do,” said Gomez, who makes a little more than $38,000 a year. “The flexibility is unbelievable. The city doesn’t tell me how to do something, they say, just do it.”

And San Juan Capistrano officials said their experience with contracting has encouraged them to further explore doing public business in the private sector.

“The situation with a contract worker is that it gives both the contractor and the city the greatest amount of flexibility in responding to all types of economic and community issues,” said Al King Jr., director of community services. “It is and has been a critical component of our delivery of city services.”

Private Practice: Business Firms Provide City Services

Orange County cities are fighting tough fiscal times by giving public business to private companies. Every city in the county uses at least one private firm to do a job traditionally in the realm of municipal government--a practice known as privatization. Below is a list of some of the more commonly contracted services and the cities that use them.

* City: Anaheim Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: + Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total of 330 privatized functions including convention center Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $134 *City: Brea Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: + Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: audits Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.5 *City: Buena Park Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: Computer services: Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: police photography processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $2-3 *City: Costa Mesa Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: golf course operations, audits Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): unavailable *City: Cypress Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: traffic citation processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.7 *City: Dana Point Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: + Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $4.9 *City: Fountain Valley Building plan checks: Legal services: Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $2 *City: Fullerton Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: golf course operations, major project designs Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): unavailable *City: Garden Grove Building plan checks: + Legal services: Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: golf course operations Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $7.5-10 *City: Huntington Beach Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: beach concessions, parking citation processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): unavailable *City: Irvine Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: train station Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $12 *City: Laguna Beach Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: Selected other services: audits Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.8 *City: Laguna Hills Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $3 *City: Laguna Niguel Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $2.2 *City: La Habra Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: Selected other services: sewer cleaning, parking citation processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): unavailable *City: Lake Forest Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: newsletter, microfilming Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.9 *City: La Palma Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: medical services, workers’ compensation administration Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.1 *City: Los Alamitos Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.3 *City: Mission Viejo Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: + Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: emergency preparedness planning Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $8.2 *City: Newport Beach Building plan checks: Legal services: Engineering services: Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: ** Street maintenance: Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $.1 *City: Orange Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: traffic citation processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $25 *City: Placentia Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: Selected other services: traffic citation processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $3.7 *City: San Clemente Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: weed abatement, medical waste disposal Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): unavailable *City: San Juan Capistrano Building plan checks: Legal services: Engineering services: Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: + Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: human relations program, horse trail Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $2-3 *City: Santa Ana Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: parking garage, zoo veterinarian services Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $11.8 *City: Seal Beach Building plan checks: Legal services: Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $1.2 *City: Stanton Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: weed abatement Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $.5 *City: Tustin Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $2.3 *City: Villa Park Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $.2 *City: Westminster Building plan checks: Legal services: + Engineering services: Computer services: Fleet maintenance: Graffiti removal: Janitorial services: Landscaping maintenance: Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: parking ticket processing Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $.7 *City: Yorba Linda Building plan checks: + Legal services: + Engineering services: + Computer services: + Fleet maintenance: + Graffiti removal: + Janitorial services: + Landscaping maintenance: + Parks, Rec. services: + Refuse: + ** Street maintenance: + Selected other services: Total contracts (rounded to nearest million): $4.2 *** Street repair and related services (includes curb and gutter repair, traffic signal maintenance, street resurfacing, traffic median maintenance, street light repair, street sweeping and sidewalk repair)

Source: Individual cities

Los Angeles Times