O.C. Vector District Agrees to Forgo Employee Bonuses

The Orange County Vector Control District has decided not to pay bonuses to its employees this year and instead use the money -- about $80,000 -- toward eradicating the red imported fire ant.

The agency had been criticized for paying bonuses to employees with money it earned doing work for such agencies as the state Department of Transportation, UC Irvine and Disney’s California Adventure theme park.

In 2002, the district disbursed its first round of bonuses, a few thousand dollars per employee. It froze the bonuses this year after receiving a complaint from the state. Members of the vector district’s board of directors and some private pest control companies also questioned whether it was appropriate for a publicly funded agency to set aside a portion of its moonlighting profits for employee bonuses.

The district’s primary job is to monitor Orange County for mosquitoes, rats and other disease-bearing pests, funded by an annual assessment on the county’s property owners.

With the red imported fire ant program jeopardized by the cutoff of state funds, the district’s directors voted to put the bonus money into the fire ant program, said Michael Hearst, a district spokesman.

The county Board of Supervisors today is scheduled to consider whether to continue emergency funding for the ant eradication program through April -- a move that could cost several hundred thousand dollars. On Oct. 28, supervisors agreed to fund the program through Monday because of the loss of state funding. Vector officials also want financial help from cities and from local communities and homeowner associations, Hearst said.

“When everybody’s cutting back and there’s no money, you get it where you can. Rather than distribute [the bonuses], we’re putting it into the pot,� Hearst said.

Doug Davert, a member of the vector district’s board of directors, said he questioned the bonuses even before the district’s current financial troubles. The district would be hard-pressed to plead for additional funding, he said, while paying bonuses to its employees.

“It would have been hypocritical if we’re paying bonuses and then crying poor,� he said.

State officials are discussing whether to reinstate funding to the fire ant program, at the request of county and state lawmakers from Orange County. The state cut funding to the fire ant program this year because of the state’s financial crisis.

The fire ants, believed to have arrived in the United States in the 1930s aboard cargo ships, are known for fierce bites that leave victims with painful, itchy welts. They also are a threat to wildlife and agriculture.

The first reports of fire ant attacks on humans in Orange County surfaced in the late 1990s. Vector officials say they have identified 25,000 active fire ant sites in the county.

They say they’ve made significant progress in eradicating them, but the insects could become a significant problem if the program is halted.

Assemblyman Todd Spitzer said he hopes the state will eventually reinstate funding. In the meantime, local government will have to pick up the burden.

“The county shouldn’t be in this position where it’s having to fund what is absolutely a state program,� Spitzer said.

“If the Department of Food and Agriculture needs to make cuts, it shouldn’t be cutting public safety,� Spitzer said. “And fire ant eradication is a public-safety issue.�

He praised the vector district’s decision to put the bonus money pool into the fire ant program.

“The program is struggling financially. This was not the time to pay bonuses,� he said.