Fact Check: Mayor Wrong on Layoff Count

Statement: “These (are) tough economic times for the city of San Diego, where library hours have been reduced and police and fire personnel have been laid off,” Mayor Jerry Sanders said in a news release Monday.

Determination: False

Analysis: Library hours have been reduced and 23 civilian employees were laid off in the Police Department, but Sanders was wrong about fire personnel. No one in the Fire-Rescue Department was laid off because of the recent budget cuts.

In December, the city sliced 50 vacant positions and a few filled positions from the Fire-Rescue Department’s budget, but those people in the filled positions either moved to a lower pay grade or retired.

City Council President Ben Hueso made a similar error in March. In this case, Sanders was talking about the city’s budget woes to promote an IT contract. Sanders already made one false statement in that discussion (we’ve noted it in a previous post). And Sanders repeated a barely true statement in Monday’s press release.

Sanders described San Diego Data Processing Corporation as having a “monopoly” on the city’s IT services. That’s barely true because the city runs the nonprofit and it doesn’t get all of the city’s money for IT services.

Here’s one victory for the mayor, though: The City Council approved the IT contract Monday.

— KEEGAN KYLE