Offer to Forgo Overtime Pay Considered : Budget: County union leaders say their proposal is ‘reasonable and generous.’ Officials, who are demanding workers take an 8.25% pay cut, give lukewarm response.

Hoping to avoid a big pay cut, a union representing nearly half of Los Angeles County’s workers Monday said its members would do without overtime pay for a year--a move it maintains could save the county $90 million.

However, the proposal received a lukewarm response from county officials, who are demanding that county employees take an 8.25% pay cut to help trim $600 million in expenditures. The county is also proposing to lay off 5,000 workers, shut down dozens of health clinics and libraries and reduce benefits to welfare recipients to cope with the worst financial crisis in its history. The Board of Supervisors is to begin budget deliberations today.

Under the plan proposed Monday, employees who accrue overtime next year could opt to have their pay deferred until the following year, when the county might have more money, or could take compensatory time instead.

“This proposal offered today allows the county to avoid rollbacks of salaries, allows (county workers) to continue to contribute to the economy and to protect their families and communities, and is a reasonable and generous offer,” said Gilbert Cedillo, general manager of the Service Employees International Union, Local 660, which represents about 40,000 of the county’s 80,000-member work force.

Cedillo said the plan, outlined at a briefing at the union’s downtown headquarters, must still be put to a vote by the rank and file. He said he believes that workers will accept the proposal in order to avoid pay cuts.

The county spent $173 million in overtime this year for all workers. Cedillo said his union’s proposal represents a good faith “sacrifice” that would allow the county to focus its attention on avoiding service reductions and layoffs.

However, assistant chief administrative officer Mary Jung noted that savings from the proposed pay cut, about $215 million, have already been calculated into the budget. Further, she said, deferring overtime would not really help the county because it would only delay payment for one year.

Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke said the proposal, though promising, raised several questions. She noted that of the $173 million in county overtime payments, about $93 million was paid to workers in only two departments--sheriff’s and fire--which are not represented by Local 660. She said the deferral might be feasible if other unions also agreed to accept the terms.

The county is conducting negotiations with all 13 of its unions. The toughest bargaining has been with Local 660, whose salary contract expires at the end of September, and whose members are increasingly tense over the proposed pay cut and other issues.

Cedillo said workers in several departments have begun organized walkouts for short periods of time, usually during lunch breaks. The actions could escalate if no agreements appear to be near, Cedillo said.

Meanwhile, county officials said they will declare an impasse and bring in state mediators if a Saturday deadline for settling contract disputes is not reached in their negotiations with Local 660.