OROVILLE — The Butte County District Attorney’s Office has seen its fair share of struggles, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic.
Caseloads have stockpiled and nearly a quarter of the prosecution positions remain unfilled. However, there could be a light at the end of the tunnel.
Butte County’s Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a hiring bonus program for the District Attorney’s Office, effectively giving a total of $30,000 to new hires over the course of two payments. The first would be paid to the person once hired and the second after a probationary period.
District Attorney Mike Ramsey spoke to the board during the item, explaining that prosecutors are desperately needed.
“It is important to note that no criminal case investigated by the Sheriff’s Office or city law enforcement can go forward without review by me or one of my deputies,” Ramsey said. “… Without sufficient prosecutors to conduct these reviews, arrests become merely a two-day stay in the jail without further consequences.”
Ramsey added that each of his 21 deputy district attorneys averages a workload of 400 active criminal cases and that prosecutors do not get overtime.
The funding for the program will not come out of the county’s general fund but instead from savings accrued from the office’s Assembly Bill 109 revocation sub-fund.
“The fund has been building over several years, and I considered it to be a rainy day fund,” Ramsey said. “Well, it’s beyond raining. It’s flood season, and our situation is dire.”
It is stated in the resolution that the hiring bonuses are non-pensionable and will only apply to four vacant positions. Additionally, the program will go until March 31, 2025 at which point it will return to the board for review.
The resolution also states that the county will try to recover bonuses paid to those who leave before reaching set milestones.
With little discussion from the board, the program was approved unanimously.
Other hiring programs
Ramsey’s request was far from the only discussion regarding hiring bonuses.
Along with the approval for the DA’s Office, the board approved a change to the bonus programs set for the Butte County Sheriff’s Office as well as a retention bonus for Ramsey’s office atop the previously mentioned hiring payout.
For the Sheriff’s Office, a hiring bonus was set at $10,000 for new hires and $30,000 for lateral hires. A resolution unanimously approved by the board on Tuesday changed how this amount would be paid out. Previously, the bonuses were divvied up into three milestones but the new resolution reduced it to only two.
A second program that provides $1,500 to employees who refer a successful hire got the same treatment and was reduced to being provided immediately upon hiring the new employee rather than having its own milestones.
Ramsey stayed at the forefront and requested a longevity bonus for the sake of retaining current employees which also garnered approval from the board. Full-time employees with his office will be given $7,500 on April 1, 2024 followed by the same amount again in one year, totaling $30,000.
These programs are funded via each individual department and do not affect the general fund. Supervisor Tami Ritter noted that this helped in the decision to approve them.
“I’m supportive of these programs because we will be able to fill positions that have remained vacant for too long but the other piece I want to highlight is that I don’t know that I would be as supportive of programs like this if it had a negative impact on the general fund,” Ritter said. “I think that’s what makes these things palatable is that they’re not coming from the general fund. If it’s within the department’s budget, I think it’s easier for these things going forward.”
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