County employees are speeding in County vehicles with management’s knowledge and with no clear disciplinary consequences.

Excessive speeds by public workers driving government-owned vehicles has long been a complaint of local auditors, who have employed Global Positioning Systems to track fast-running offenders. “Nine vehicles reached speeds in excess of 90 miles per hour a total of 13 times,” noted a county review of August 2013. “County vehicles reached speeds of 85 miles per hour or more over 100 times.” Added the report, “In many instances, management also receives these speeding alerts. However, there is no specific policy to direct management on what they can and should do in these situations. As a result, County employees are speeding in County vehicles with management’s knowledge and with no clear disciplinary consequences.”

Administrators promised to fix the problem by warning them not to speed on the job. Now comes San Diego city auditor Eduardo Luna with a similar finding. “A GPS report indicated that a City employee drove at 90 mph in a City vehicle,” says a July 14 roundup of complaints to his fraud hotline. “The conduct was confirmed, and was not related to a bona fide emergency. However, City management was precluded from taking disciplinary action based on a 2015 agreement with labor organizations because the GPS report was not created in response to a citizen complaint or pre-scheduled vehicle use review,” the report continues.

“We identified the conduct through a standard over-speed report available in the GPS system. The conduct was discussed with the identified employee in a non-disciplinary context. According to City management, an annual vehicle safety notice will be issued to all City employees, and additional mandatory training will be provided to the identified employee’s team.”

Meanwhile, Luna has also uncovered one less-than-speedy San Diego civil servant. “An allegation that an employee was spending most of the working day texting, watching online videos, and reading online was investigated and partially substantiated. The Department took the appropriate corrective action with respect to the identified employee.”