Folsom reduces workforce

By Steffi Broski
CNS Staff Writer

Faced with declining revenue, Folsom city officials decided at the end of January to eliminate 55 positions within the city. Now, a retirement incentive program is expected to further shrink the city’s workforce.

The city approved the mid-year budget in late January. Four weeks later, the City Council adopted the incentive program, which offers an additional two years towards retirement to all eligible city employees in an effort to reduce the workforce.

“Let’s say somebody is 50 years old and has put in 18 years of service,” said John Spittler, director of Human Resources. “You can retire as if you had 20 years of service.”

Employees who are at least 50 years old and have invested in the California Public Employees’ Retirement System can take advantage of this option. The city of Folsom is one of many agencies contracting with CalPers that have been allowed to offer the incentive because of budget cuts and layoffs.

“We don’t know the exact number of how many employees have accepted so far, but 15 or more have indicated interest,” said Spittler.

Employees interested in the 2-year incentive have to give notice by the end of May.

On March 10, the city sent out its lay-off notices to 39 employees. Out of the 55 eliminated positions, 16 were vacant.

For employees who worked their way up the ladder – from entry to intermediate to senior level – there is an opportunity to “bump,” which means accepting a demotion rather than a layoff.

“It’s a seniority-based system,” said Spittler. “People might keep working in the department, but at a lower level.”

One of the divisions affected by the layoffs is the Folsom Zoo Sanctuary. The zoo lost three part-time zoo keepers and a part-time cashier position in addition to three positions at its education department.

“It’s impossible to pin down what will happen today or tomorrow. There have never been layoffs like that,” said zoo spokeswoman Roberta Ratcliff. “But when there’s no money, there’s no money.”

All departing city employees will leave their positions in mid-April.

Zoo Manager Jocelyn Smeltzer said that despite losing positions in the education department, there will still be opportunities for education at the zoo “just not as many as we have been lucky to have in the past.”
Smeltzer said the docent program, which provides tours for school children, will attempt to fill the void left by the departing educators. Some community members have offered to write grant applications to secure more funding for the zoo, Smeltzer said.

City Council member Ernie Sheldon said each department in the city had to come up with an amount that could be cut. The bottom line is that the budget needs to be balanced- layoffs are part of that attempt, he said.

“We hate to do what we have to do, but times are bad right now,” Sheldon said. “We don’t have any bad people. We have exceptional employees that have been doing a good job.”

Though many city positions have been eliminated, a better economic future might re-create those positions.

“It’s hard to predict the future, but things always ebb and flow,” said Spittler. “If we have very, very different economic times in the future, who knows how the city will deal with that.”