Through California’s budget busts and rosier-than-expected revenues, in good times and bad, two things have held steady during Gov. Jerry Brown’s third term: the size and payroll of the state workforce.
But while the overall bureaucracy remained unchanged, many departments added staff and others axed jobs. Economics, federal funding and court decisions triggered some of the changes. Politics guided others.
The number of employees under the governor’s authority has remained flat despite the departure of a combined 10,000 workers from the state’s prison system, the Employment Development Department and the Department of Developmental Services. The mass exodus of staff from 2011 through 2013 amounted to about 4 percent of the current state workforce, according to state pay records analyzed by The Sacramento Bee.
Hiring continued elsewhere. The Department of Health Services and the fledgling Health Benefit Exchange, for example, added a combined 1,600 employees over the three-year span.
http://www.sacbee.com/2014/03/24/6261710/californias-state-payroll-holds.html
