South Coast Air Quality Management District

Appropriate Funds to Implement Permit Backlog Reduction Program

SYNOPSIS: 

At the Board’s Special Meeting, February 23, 2001, the Board requested that $2.5 million from the Undesignated Fund Balance be used to fund a nine-month permit application backlog reduction program, which includes hiring temporary engineers. This action would authorize appropriation for the first three months of the program in the current fiscal year budget.

COMMITTEE: 

Administrative, March 9, 2001, Recommended for Approval

RECOMMENDED ACTION:

Appropriate $896,000 from the Undesignated Fund Balance to the FY 2000-01 Budget in the following Major Objects: Salary & Employee Benefits $73,400 and Services & Supplies $822,600.

Barry R. Wallerstein, D.Env.
Executive Officer

Background

At its February 16 meeting, the Governing Board was presented with an expenditure plan for one-time revenue of $17 million from a civil penalty payment from AES Alamitos. Staff submitted a total of eight recommendations to be implemented with the funds. One of the suggested programs submitted by Engineering & Compliance was the Permit Backlog Reduction Program. This proposal involves creating a new Senior Engineering Manager and two new Senior Engineer positions to be opened for promotional opportunity to supervise a staff of approximately 35 temporary engineers who would be hired to reduce the current permit backlog. This program has a cost estimate of $2.5 million for the duration of nine months. At the February 16 meeting, the Board requested that staff provide more detailed information on each of the recommended programs that would be funded with the $17 million. This additional information was presented at a special Governing Board meeting held on February 23, 2001.

Staff presented a detailed implementation plan for the Permit Inventory Reduction Program at the special Governing Board meeting on February 23. It was the sense of the Board Members present that the $2.5 million required for this program should not be taken from the $17 million AES settlement funds, but instead should be funded from the existing Undesignated Fund Balance. Therefore, staff is proposing to use funds from the Undesignated Fund Balance to implement this program.

Proposal

The Permit Inventory Reduction Program will be a nine-month program beginning April 1 and concluding December 31, 2001 with three months of the program (April – June) occurring in the current FY 2000-01 and the remaining six months (July – Dec) concluding in FY 2001-02. Accordingly, the funding for this program will require that a portion of the costs be immediately encumbered in the current FY 2000-01 budget for the April initiation of the program. The remaining funds that will be spent in the next Fiscal Year will be incorporated into the proposed FY 2001-02 budget. In estimating the amount of funds to be encumbered immediately, one third of the salary costs for permanent and temporary staff were considered along with the total costs required for equipment and supplies.

The program will be staffed by a new Senior Engineering Manager position, two new Senior Engineer positions and approximately 35 temporary engineers. Each Senior Engineer will have a staff of 12 temporary engineers. The eleven remaining temporary engineers will be disbursed among the five existing permitting teams.

The Executive Officer proposes the following nine-month expenditure plan for the Permit Inventory Reduction Program.

Salaries & Employee Benefits

Temporary Engineers

Other Expenses

Total Funds Required for 9-month Program

Fiscal Impacts

It is anticipated that a significant portion of the cost of this program will be offset by additional permit processing revenues.

Attachment

None

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