Riverside County departments spent more than $105 million on overtime in fiscal 2018-19, up $22 million from the previous fiscal year, according to a new report from Auditor-Controller Paul Angulo.

Seven of eight departments with overtime costs exceeding $1 million spent more on overtime compared to last fiscal year, Angulo’s office found. Some of these agencies, including the Sheriff’s Department, said grants and other outside funding sources paid for overtime and lessened the impact to the county’s bottom line.

The surge in overtime spending worries Supervisor Kevin Jeffries.

“After several years of declining costs for overtime, the recent overall increase is very concerning,” he said. “It appears that a majority of the departments incurring significant overtime were attempting to meet state-required services and mandates.”

County spokeswoman Brooke Federico said the county “welcomes this opportunity each year to review overtime practices. County departments proactively manage overtime based on mission critical needs, particularly in departments that run 24-hour operations. We regularly work with departments to ensure that overtime is properly managed.”

The annual overtime report, which is on Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors agenda, comes as the county continues to grapple with rising costs that outpace revenue growth. Labor costs for the county’s 20,000 or so employees make up the biggest expense of the county’s $6.1 billion budget.

An elected official who serves as the county’s fiscal watchdog, Angulo’s overtime monitoring program started in 2013.

“Appropriate overtime is a cost-effective response to short-term labor shortages or spikes in service demands as compared to hiring additional employees,” the overtime report reads.

“However, long-term overtime or uncontrolled uses of overtime represent significant risks of increased direct and indirect costs” such as increased turnover, lower productivity and higher likelihood of fatigue leading to errors that could prompt lawsuits.

Collectively, the county spent almost $83 million on overtime in fiscal 2017-18, according to last year’s report. Three-hundred fifty county employees earned at least 50 percent of their base pay in overtime last year, up from 139 in 2017, Angulo’s office found.

The sheriff’s office spent the most on overtime – $61.4 million – of any county department last fiscal year, the report read. The sheriff’s overtime costs were $43 million in fiscal 2017-18.

In a response included in the report, sheriff’s officials said: “A review of gross numbers fails to appropriately reflect the fact that 45 percent of Sheriff’s Department overtime spending was reimbursed through grants, court security funding, special events charges, and payments from cities that contract with the sheriff for law enforcement.”

“Approximately $25.7 million of overtime costs were anticipated and built into the budgets approved by each jurisdiction reimbursing those costs,” the response reads. “So, the overtime for those operations caused no ‘budget overruns,’ or unanticipated charges, and did not impact Net County Cost” or the bottom-line cost to county government.

The report touches on other departments with overtime costs in excess of $1 million, including:

• The Department of Public Social Services, which saw its overtime costs rise about $634,000 to $6.07 million. Department officials blamed the increase on higher caseload levels for Medi-Cal, food stamps, In-Home Supportive Services and child and adult protective services.

• Probation, which saw overtime expenses go from $1.72 million to $2.14 million. The department said its overtime rose in part because it’s hard to find qualified candidates to fill vacant jobs.

• The District Attorney’s Office, where overtime rose by almost $402,000 to $1.95 million. “Multiple high-profile critical cases,” including proceedings related to the abuse of the Turpin children and the trial of a man convicted of murdering two Palm Springs police officers, factored into the higher overtime costs, officials said.

• The Economic Development Agency, which spent roughly $1.11 million on overtime last fiscal year, an increase of almost $200,000. The largest chunk was spent on maintenance due to “unplanned emergency response or scheduled preventative work that was either season, driven by regulatory compliance, and/or fire life safety and health protocols,” officials said.

“The year-over-year increases in overtime at the Economic Development Agency is troublesome,” Jeffries said, adding his office is looking at a plan to reorganize the agency early next year.

• Riverside University Health System – Medical Center, which made headlines in 2014 for soaring overtime costs, actually spent about $259,000 less in overtime – $20.2 million in all – last fiscal year compared to fiscal 2017-18. Officials credited the drop to better internal staffing controls.

Million-dollar OT club

Riverside County Auditor-Controller Paul Angulo’s report on overtime spending lists eight departments that spent more than $1 million in overtime last fiscal year. They are:

Department of Public Social Services: $6.07 million, up $634,355 from fiscal 2017-18.

Probation: $2.14 million, up $426,365.

District Attorney: $1.95 million, up $401,944.

Economic Development Agency: $1.11 million, up $197,619.

Fire Department: $2.21 million, up $7,354.

Sheriff’s Department: $61.4 million, up $18.3 million.

Behavioral Health: $2.31 million, up $49,567.

Riverside University Health System – Medical Center: $20.2 million, down $258,940.