For the first time anyone can recall, state government employment has shrunk for two years in a row, shedding nearly 4,700 full-time jobs since 2009, more than 7 percent of the workforce.

By Andrew Garber

Seattle Times Olympia bureau

 

Gerry Ketchum, a Workfirst program supervisor, says cubicles once full of workers at his Belltown office are now used mostly for storage.

 

With state job cuts, Charlotte Headley, a corrections supervisor, has been bumped to four different jobs in 18 months.

 

Gerry Ketchum, a Workfirst program supervisor, says cubicles once full of workers at his Belltown office are now used mostly for storage.

 

With state job cuts, Charlotte Headley, a corrections supervisor, has been bumped to four different jobs in 18 months.

OLYMPIA — Gerry Ketchum says he can walk you through Department of Social and Health Services offices that look like a ghost town because of jobs cuts.

In some cases, after passing through a busy front lobby, "you walk back and I'm like, 'Where are all the people? What happened to all the people who used to be here?' " said Ketchum, who works at a state DSHS office in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood.

For the first time anyone can recall, state government employment has shrunk for two years in a row due to budget cuts, shedding nearly 4,700 full-time jobs since 2009. That's more than 7 percent of the workforce.

State figures show the biggest job losses have occurred in King, Pierce and Thurston counties.

Most of those who have left the state workforce since fiscal 2009 did so on their own, state figures indicate. About 21 percent of the losses were through layoffs, although that figure varies widely by agency.

Excluding higher education and K-12 jobs, there were 58,909 full-time-equivalent positions in general state government in fiscal year 2011, down from 63,591 in 2009.

The number of public employees has dipped slightly from one year to the next before, but records going back 26 years show no reductions as large as the current one.

The trend is expected to continue because of extensive budget cuts made by the Legislature this year, and renewed signs of a weak economy. Gov. Chris Gregoire recently directed state agencies to prepare for additional cuts of up to $1.7 billion because of lackluster tax collections.

The governor's budget director, Marty Brown, said more job cuts clearly will be needed. "I don't think there is any question," he said.

Arun Raha, the state's chief economist, said the picture is more dramatic when you factor in thousands of additional jobs cut by local governments.

Combined, those job losses account for about a half percentage point in the state's 9.3 percent unemployment rate, he said.

The losses create a drag on the economy, he said, and like Brown, Raha doesn't expect the bleeding to stop soon. "We've lost about two-thirds of what we will eventually lose," he said.

Although almost every state agency has lost workers, the two largest departments — DSHS and the state Department of Corrections — account for two-thirds of the cuts.

Agency staff say the shrinking workforce has taken a toll on both workers and state residents.

Many corrections workers have been laid off, while others have played a nightmarish game of musical chairs as the agency closed older prisons to save money and shed 760 full-time jobs since 2009 — about a 9 percent drop.

Charlotte Headley, a 38-year-old single mother of three, was working as a lieutenant at the Cedar Creek Corrections Center in Littlerock, Thurston County, when budget cuts hit in late 2009.

Her job was eliminated, but she landed a new position at the McNeil Island prison, near Steilacoom. The Legislature then began talking about closing that facility and she took a job at the Mission Creek Corrections Center in Belfair, Mason County.

That position was cut after about six months, and she took a job as a unit supervisor at the prison in Monroe.

Headley, who lives in Olympia, now has a four-hour round-trip commute each day.

"The time I have with my kids is real limited now," she said. "I don't make it to the gym like I used to at all. I have to be real careful with my time, and my weekends are kind of full of catching up on all the chores that are not getting done through the week."

Headley said she's looking for a job closer to home to reduce her commute time. "I've been interviewing quite a bit," she said.

The prospect of more budget cuts makes workers nervous, Headley said.

"We're all pretty worried about how that's going to impact jobs, families and homes, as well as how it will impact daily work inside of prison, the workload, and bracing ourselves for doing more with less."

DSHS has been hit harder than any other state agency in terms of the sheer number of positions cut — 2,400 full-time jobs since 2009, roughly 13 percent of its workforce, according to numbers from the governor's budget office.

Agency officials say the workload for the remaining employees has increased as jobs have been cut, and that often translates into longer waits for people who need help.

For example, it takes workers longer now to process applications for long-term-care services, such as help to the infirm with bathing, eating and moving around their homes, said Bill Moss, director of the Home and Community Services Division for DSHS, which administers the long-term care Medicaid benefit.

"People when they apply for long-term care ... we have a policy that requires us to get those services done in 30 days," Moss said. "There are some areas where we could see that time frame almost double to 60 days."

Ketchum said DSHS not only has fewer state workers to handle people's needs but the agency also has fewer resources to help.

He works in a program aimed at helping the unemployed find jobs.

In the past, state workers could help people get bus passes, haircuts, new clothing, a general equivalency diploma, even needed medical exams.

State resources now have been reduced to "just dishing out a few bus passes that go to a very small percentage of people who qualify for them," said Ketchum, a 25-year veteran of the agency.

"It's long been our philosophy to move people forward and to get people into sustainability," he said. "It's becoming harder and harder to do that because our resources and staff levels are down."

Andrew Garber: 360-236-8266

or agarber@seattletimes.com

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