Contra Costa County Grand Jury
• 2011-2012
• Agency Response
Response to:
City Retirement Plan - An Unsustainable Benefit?
A Report by the 2011-2012 Contra Costa County Grand Jury*
⚠️ Translation Notice: This content has been automatically translated. The original English text is the official version. Translation may contain errors.
⚠️ Este contenido ha sido traducido automáticamente. El texto original en inglés es la versión oficial. La traducción puede contener errores.
Note: Missing finding numbers detected: F2
Findings and Recommendations 6 findings
F1
Declining revenue and increasing personnel costs have placed many of the County's fire agencies in a challenging, and sometimes dire, financial position. There is a need to examine alternatives to how County fire agencies are structured and how they should most effectively deploy their equipment for the services they deliver.
Related Recommendations (1)
R1
Any proposed parcel tax by any fire agency seeking immediate relief for current deficit issues should include a "sunset clause" limiting duration. Any proposed parcel tax by any fire agency seeking immediate relief for current deficit issues should include a commitment to promptly undertake identification and evaluation of alternative service delivery models. All fire agencies and the County should conduct, on an individual agency and county-wide basis, evaluations of alternative service models utilizing independent consultants with a history of analyzing fire agency challenges.
F3
Under their current operating models, it is not feasible for some fire agencies to reduce expenses enough to meet projected revenue without impacting service levels.
No recommendations for this finding
F4
In the short term, to provide the service levels that the public currently expects, additional revenue must be found for some individual fire agencies.
Related Recommendations (1)
R4
Fire agencies, LAFCO, and the County should find ways to cooperate with one another in the evaluation and adoption of alternative service delivery models.
F5
In the long term, approaching common problems at a County-wide regional level could offer additional solutions.
No recommendations for this finding
F6
Other California fire agencies have successfully implemented innovative cost reduction models and strategies, often by consolidating fire agencies, after engaging external consultants with industry expertise.
No recommendations for this finding
F7
Creating and pursuing a County-wide strategy will require extraordinary leadership and cooperation at both the County and individual district levels. Contra Costa County 2011-2012 Grand Jury Report 1211
No recommendations for this finding
* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.