A study released Wednesday blasted San Diego County for understaffing its social services department at a time when the demand for services, such as food stamps and other welfare programs, is increasing because of a struggling economy and high unemployment.

County officials said in a written statement that the study was a labor-sponsored “stunt.”

The study by San Diego State University and the San Diego-based Center on Policy Initiatives, which bills itself as an advocacy organization that promotes the interests of working people, reports that understaffing is deteriorating worker morale and degrading the services they provide. It says that the county needs to increase the number of workers processing welfare applications to keep up with the high demand.

The study, which includes a survey of 342 workers, looked specifically at the county’s efforts to reorganize its Family Resource Center employees, who process applications for food assistance and other welfare services.

“There is considerable more cases per staff member and it’s impossible for them to keep up with the cases,” said Jill Esbenshade, a professor of sociology at San Diego State University, who conducted the study along with a group of students.

In its statement, the county said the center was linked to the Service Employees International Union, which represents many of the county’s workers.

“This report reflects a stunt by a labor organization, trying to pass itself off as some sort of think tank, to garner attention for labor related issues,” according to the county’s statement. “The Center on Policy Initiatives is funded by numerous organizations including Service Employees International Union, SEIU, and the ‘independent’ researcher involved in the report is affiliated with Center on Policy Initiatives.”

Esbenshade said the study was funded by the university’s department of sociology and was conducted with the help of unpaid graduate students. The union helped provide access to the workers but it did not fund the study, she said.

Susan Duerksen, a spokeswoman for the Center on Policy Initiatives, said the county’s comment was an attempt to deflect attention from the study’s findings.

While the monthly average of newly submitted CalWorks and food stamp applications increased by 97 percent from 2001 to 2010, the number of workers processing the applications has increased only 1 percent over the same time period, according to the study.

For years, the county was criticized for being at the bottom among the 24 largest metropolitan areas in making sure the poor, unemployed and homeless have enough to eat. That ranking was first issued to the county in 2006 by the Food Research and Action Center, a Washington based nonprofit that combats hunger.

To address the problem, the county increased advertising for the program and implemented several changes to the way it processes applications for assistance. According to the study, those changes, including a new computer software system, has failed to improve efficiency and may be responsible for increasing delays.

“The problems have included erroneous approvals and denials as well as conflicting notices to clients,” according to the study. “Most users report that the system, goes down multiple times a week for several hours at a time. As a result, clients have to submit documents more than once and make repeat trips to the Family Resource Centers.”

In its statement, the county said employees were involved in making the workflow changes.

“Employee satisfaction is important to the county,” according to the statement. “For this reason, employees were involved in the initial design of the operational changes, and the county sought feedback through ongoing meetings and focus groups, and through an e-mail account set up specifically to solicit feedback.”

The study makes several recommendations to improve services, such as including workers in making decisions on how to improve the application system, increasing staff levels and improving training for workers.

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