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May revision vacancy and efficiency drills target special funds; DFW and State Parks outline cuts and seek to minimize service impacts
Summary
The administration used control‑section authority and an efficiencies exercise to reduce vacant positions and operating spending across departments, including significant vacancy reductions at the Department of Fish and Wildlife and selected special‑fund adjustments at State Parks. Department officials said they prioritized public safety and core
The Department of Finance implemented a two‑part efficiency exercise under the May revision: (1) a vacancy reduction drill that identifies and eliminates a portion of authorized but unfilled positions across departments and (2) a separate, expenditure‑based efficiencies exercise tied to a control‑section directive. Both exercises apply across fund sources, including special funds.
"The vacancies reductions were, as mentioned, across the board, sort of agnostic on fund source," an Andrew Hull (Department of Finance) representative said. The Department of Finance said the vacancy drill is intended to reduce long‑standing vacancy backlogs and free up budget authority that is not actively funding filled positions.
Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) and State Parks officials described how they implemented the reductions and the steps they took to preserve critical public‑safety services. CDFW said the vacancy drill affected a large share of eligible vacancies and that the department focused on maintaining field operations, hatchery programs, and other statutory mandates. "We prioritized public safety, public services, operations, as well as public critical statutory mandates for species management, such as our hatchery operations," a CDFW official told the committee.
State Parks said the State Park and Recreation Fund was not affected by the vacancy and efficiency drills but that smaller special funds such as the Harbors and Watercraft Revolving Fund and the Off‑Highway Vehicle Trust Fund were part of proposed adjustments. State Parks said it attempted to protect visitor services and safety while reducing administrative spending and pursuing revenue actions for funds with structural gaps.
Legislators and the Legislative Analyst's Office urged caution. LAO staff told members that the administration had authority under last year's budget agreement to implement vacancy reductions and that detailed GLBC (Governor's Letters to the Legislature) notices were provided in May; LAO recommended additional review because the letters arrived late for legislative oversight. LAO also cautioned that a vacant position does not automatically mean the position is not needed, and that in many programs vacancies reflect recruitment, training and multi‑year hiring cycles.
Members pressed agencies to provide program‑level impacts and service analyses. Several senators asked for more granular information that links proposed reductions to operational outcomes, including game warden staffing levels, timber‑harvest review capacity, oil‑spill prevention oversight, and invasive species responses such as the newly detected golden mussel.
What happens next: the control‑section changes for the current fiscal year can be implemented administratively by the Department of Finance; proposed budget‑year adjustments in the May revision are part of the Governor's budget and can be altered by the Legislature. Agencies were directed to provide the committee with program‑level impacts and to propose mitigations where public safety or legal mandates could be affected.
