Legal fees exceed city budget

As I was working on a story about legal fees in city of Rosemead, this article was pointed out to me regarding Burke, Williams and Sorensen, which is Rosemead's redevelopment agency attorney.

Legal fees eating into city of Hemet's budget
10:00 PM PDT on Monday, March 10, 2008

By HERBERT ATIENZA
The Press-Enterprise

Hemet officials expect a gap of about $3.1 million between what it earns and what it spends for fiscal year 2007-08, and among the biggest factors contributing to the deficit are attorney fees expected to be about $1.25 million more than expected.

City officials said they will cut the deficit by adopting cost-saving steps.

If those efforts are not enough, Hemet may have to tap into its reserves to fill the spending gap, Finance Director Laura Nomura said.

She said Hemet's general fund budget for 2007-08 is $38 million and it has $5.6 million in reserves.

Nomura recently gave the City Council a mid-year budget review to examine how finances are doing relative to projections when the budget was adopted in the beginning of the fiscal year.

She said lower than expected sales-tax revenue and higher costs have combined to create the gap. Ideally, she said, Hemet's spending must equal revenue, leaving a zero balance.

Among the higher costs were attorney fees. The city had budgeted $1.2 million for legal fees for 2007-08, but actual costs are expected to be about $2.4 million, Nomura said.

City Attorney Eric Vail said the higher costs were caused by major projects and work from his office that required more billable hours.

"We do not self-initiate work," said Vail, who said the legal work was directed by the city manager or the council.

He said his law firm, Burke, Williams and Sorensen, did not seek a rate increase in 2007-08.