SHERIFF'S TIME RECORDS INADEQUATE.

Byline: Troy Anderson Staff Writer

Sheriff Lee Baca has no idea how much it really costs to provide service to contract cities such as Santa Clarita, so he can't determine whether his department is getting too much money from them - or not enough, says a new audit from the county Auditor-Controller's Office.

The audit comes as the sheriff is facing up to $143 million in cuts to the department's $1.7 billion budget and is in the process of releasing 2,600 jail inmates to reduce costs.

The audit found the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department does not keep accurate records on whether the 41 cities it provides law enforcement services to are paying the actual cost of services.

Santa Clarita, the county's largest contract city, has an $11.7 million contract with the department for this fiscal year.

The central problem is that the Sheriff's Department has chosen not to use time cards, arguing it would take an average of 15 minutes a day per employee to fill out a time card. Auditors said their experience with employees performing multiple tasks is it take 30 seconds to a minute to fill out a time card.

Auditors found the system used to track the amount of time patrol deputies work is not accurate and cannot be used to bill contract cities for the actual services provided, noting the lack of accurate records could result in the Sheriff's Department subsidizing contract cities for law enforcement services.

``This practice will continue to result in the county either subsidizing the cities or overcharging them,'' auditors wrote.

The finding alarmed county officials, who said the audits mean the Sheriff's Department may be providing services that aren't paid for, while taking deputies away from unincorporated areas such as Stevenson Ranch and Castaic.

``I can't believe this,'' said Chief Administrative Officer David Janssen. ``The problem that triggered this audit had to do with Pico Rivera. They concluded that they had over-provided services for certain months.''

Janssen said the Board of Supervisors is concerned that money used to pay for sheriff's services in unincorporated areas is being used to subsidize services in contract cities.

``Because we have a contract with (each) city, the Sheriff's Department will make sure that all vacancies are automatically covered, either by overtime or assigning a deputy,'' Janssen said. ``If they are short a deputy, those will come out of the unincorporated areas because they don't have a contract for services in the unincorporated areas.''

The supervisors have received complaints from residents of communities without city government who claim deputies are taken away from unincorporated territory to serve in cities.

The audit found that contracts with cities require the sheriff to bill the contract cities for actual services provided. However, the sheriff does not have sufficient supporting documentation to bill based on actual services provided, and instead bills for services based on the contract budget.

The Sheriff's Department provides patrol deputies in the unincorporated parts of the county and to 41 cities, including Agoura Hills, Calabasas, Westlake Village, Hidden Hills, Malibu, Palmdale, Lancaster, Santa Clarita and La Canada Flintridge.

About 2,200 deputies are assigned to patrol with approximately 1,000 assigned to contract cities. In 2001-02, the department collected $170 million for contract city patrol services.

The department currently gathers data on hours deputies work through its dispatch system when deputies log on at the beginning of their shifts.

Auditors recalculated the amount of time shown as worked in contract cities for three sheriff's stations over five days and noted miscalculations at every station every day.

The Santa Clarita station reported zero nonbillable ``excess minutes,'' but auditors found 33 excess hours were provided.

The San Dimas station overreported deputy services by 33 hours and underreported other staff time by 12 hours for one day.

The auditors recommended the Sheriff's Department require all staff, particularly contract city patrol deputies, to use timecards for specific tasks and to bill cities for actual services provided.

Assistant Sheriff R. Doyle Campbell said the department does not agree that the use of timecards would reduce errors, but rather would increase the likelihood of errors as two levels of manual entry would be added.

Assuming that each employee spends 15 minutes to complete the timecard, Campbell said this would result in an estimated loss of 130,000 patrol hours annually, or the equivalent of 74 sheriff's deputies at an annual cost of $7 million.

Rather, Campbell said the department wants to use a new automated tracking program, in development the past year, that allows deputies to enter hours worked directly into their mobile digital computers.