An Audit Report
At tomorrow’s Fullerton City Council meeting, agenda item #1 features a report by the firm of Grant Thornton Risk Advisory Services. They will present what the City is calling a “special fiscal audit.”
What does that mean, and what are the results? Unknown because there is no staff report – not even a little introductory prose. This is in keeping with former City communications regarding the recently revealed erroneous assignments of millions into General Fund reserves – money that was supposed to go elsewhere. The last post FFFF did on this subject in March pointed out the condescending gobbledygook press release that emanated from City Hall. I believe this “audit” was commissioned to address the big errors and allay fears that some sort of malfeasance took place.
I hope that Messrs. Shawn Stewart and Charles Mayes (CPA) of Grant Thornton will present something real simple. Like maybe a diagram, or a flow chart to explain how these bogus transactions took place. Where did the money come from, where did it go, and when was it fixed? One hopes there will be no verbal or logical gymnastics to dodge assignment of responsibility. Does one hope in vain? And of course please let us know:
What are the true balances in General Fund and Capital Improvement Reserves.
Item #12 on the agenda is a report on staff vacancies and retention recruitment efforts required, as usual, by a nosey and intrusive State legislature. I’m not sure what the purpose of the law is, but the information contained in the report is worth considering. According to staff there are currently 65 vacancies, two thirds of which are non sworn, general public employees. 65 vacancies is about 10% of the total labor force.
In past years the vacancy rate has done as high as 25% in Fiscal Year 21/22.
Here’s the issue. How many of these vacant positions are included in the current 25/26 budget deliberations? All of them? Some cities use a “vacancy factor” in their budgeting – an estimate of how many vacancies will be unfilled in the fiscal year. Does Fullerton do this? They should if they don’t.
I also note that the labor force in Fullerton is up 7% since 22/23 even as dire predictions of the structural deficit were publicized. Why did this happen? The architect of past city budgets, City Manager Eric Levitt quit and took a higher paying job in San Bernardino last year so no answer will be forthcoming from him.
As an example of a recruitment the staff report includes this graphic from last fall:
An Associate Planner goes for $84K to $108K per annum – not counting benefits and pension costs, of course. If those are generally calculated at a modest 25% we can assume this Associate Planner will cost the taxpayers around $120,000 a year, which I think is fairly reasonable.
If we assume the average total cost of those 65 vacant positions is, say, a conservative $100,000, then we are looking at an annual cost of $6,500,000. That closes a lot of budget deficit, right there.
Pro sales tax advocates will claim there is a vital quality-of-life issue at stake, as if the number of public employees in City Halls guarantees such a concept; these vacant jobs are key to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in Fullerton. The same alliance of cops, “firefighters” and local City Hall camp followers who pushed Measure S in 2020 will claim it to be so. These are the same folks who get guaranteed defined benefit pensions, step pay increases, etc. They make no sacrifices and are rarely asked to do so. That task falls upon the citizenry.
Sales tax increases are the solution to fiscal incompetence by bungling, incompetent bureaucrats and anemic, impotent city council members.
Fullerton put a sales tax on the ballot?
In 2020.
How much money has the city burned putting a tax initiative on the ballot the last voting cycles?
$0 after 2020.
Our housing element was decertified last time the planning department was cleared out, which is why there’s that Builders Remedy project on Harbor. If we don’t fill our planning department, expect a lot more of those
Cuts require precision and deliberateness if you want the city to remain functional
“Our housing element was decertified last time the planning department was cleared out,”
Really? I wonder.
The City Council, City Hall and Administration, police, and fire services have been nothing but a parade of greed and incompetence for decades in Fullerton. That’s why Fullerton is the Bell of Orange County.
The administration has been weak. The “public safety” unions are always just in it for themselves – and as their jobs got safer and safer, they kept getting more and more.
It is the people who want job security and benefits without following through or their particular departments lack of office procedures. Relying on contractors to do very little and staff in a fog about what needs to be done. The contracted companies in regards to business licensing has neglected to follow up on businesses who have not renewed license, not paying taxes like all other businesses. No penalties for 5 years of not relicensing is crazy. That is just one specific department who know not what to do because the previous person retired and has no procedure instead just deer in the headlights. No one is at the wheel.
About 35 years ago the “contracting out” drive was big in local governments. It should have caused an overall reduction in employees but that was not the aim of the bureaucracies, of course, Instead all sorts of “consultants” have been hired to do stuff but it only meant a defusing of responsibility since the governments are almost always contributing to some fuck-up or other.
No place is worse than the County of Orange where the money amounts are titanic and absolutely no one is paying attention. That’s why the history of IT management and construction projects is so dismal.