As the city of Baltimore prepares to cut the custodial jobs they've held for years, David Williamson is worried while Victor Farmer couldn't be more pleased.

It's tough to argue with either reaction.

City officials have promised to help find jobs for all 41 janitors whose jobs will be eliminated next week, with the start of the new fiscal year. They say most of the 176 workers whose jobs were privatized last year have fared well - 86 percent got higher-paying city jobs or were able to retire.

Among last year's successes: a janitor who landed a job as an accounting assistant for the city.

The next wave of privatization takes effect Monday, and Farmer has already come out ahead. He landed a laborer's job with the Department of Public Works, making about $20 more a week.

"It worked out great," said Farmer, 49, an East Baltimore resident who has worked for the city for more than seven years.

But some workers - even those who fall in the city's "success" column - say they've suffered from last year's job losses. Some whose hourly wages went up used to take home more with overtime available on their old jobs. And some who were eligible for city retirement are barely scraping by because they're too young for Social Security.

Williamson, who has worked for the city for 24 years and makes about $24,000 a year, fears he'll join their lot. He has applied for a Department of Public Works laborer position and got his doctor's permission for the more strenuous work - something he needed because he recently had a pacemaker placed in his chest to correct an irregular heartbeat.

He said he is waiting for the city to offer him a new job. His last day of work is tomorrow. "My health is not up to par, and I just really don't know what I'm going to do," said Williamson, 48, who lives with his 94-year-old mother near Patterson Park. "It's really difficult living day by day. It's coming down to the wire."

Under the fiscal 2003 budget approved June 17, the city expects to save $600,000 annually by cutting the 41 Recreation and Parks Department janitors. By replacing 176 custodians and security guards with private help last year, the city is saving $3 million annually, officials say.

The city's accounting of how the 176 workers fared offers hope for those about to lose their jobs: 56 percent filled vacant city jobs with higher pay; 30 percent had enough years with the city to retire with benefits; and 2 percent found private-sector jobs with help from the city's employment office. The remaining 12 percent didn't find work before their jobs were cut, were terminated for cause or are pursuing personnel action.

But those figures paint a picture that in some cases is a little rosier than reality. Consider Rosemary Cummings of Essex. She retired after her job was cut last year but not willingly.

After 21 years as a city custodian, she is eligible for city retirement benefits. But at 54, she is too young to draw Social Security. Cummings said the city offered her a laborer's job, but she couldn't pass the physical, which required her to lift 50 pounds.

"I retired but, you know, my retirement ain't nothing," she said. "You can't even buy groceries on that. ... I'm making it off of unemployment but I'm scratching. I can't live like I used to live."

For Ellouise Johnson of West Baltimore, last year's outsourcing was something of a mixed blessing. A City Hall security guard for 12 years, she found a job in the city mailroom.

Johnson, 44, says she likes her new work better. She works days now and doesn't miss the night shifts she pulled as a guard. But financially, she has taken a hit. While the new job pays a little more by the hour, she worked plenty of overtime as a guard. Overall, she is out "several thousand" dollars a year, she said. She declined to be more specific.

Angela Harden of the city's Beechfield neighborhood is one who came out on top.

A single mother of two, she took a job as a city custodian more than 20 years ago because the night shift allowed her to study accounting during the day at Towson University. She got 2 1/2 years of classes under her belt but stuck with custodial work because she was comfortable with it.

It took the jolt of her impending job loss last year to get her thinking about putting her schooling to work. City job-placement workers suggested she take an accounting test, and she passed.

Harden landed a job as an accounting assistant in the city's Department of Public Works. She declined to disclose how much she earns but says it is about $2,000 more a year than she made as a custodian.

"It's allowed me to use the skills that I went to school for," said Harden, who plans to resume her studies in the fall. "I go home feeling better because it's not manual labor."

Darcell Thomas, 44, of West Baltimore also wound up with a better job. A city custodian for four years, she found work as a water department laborer. Her duties are about the same as they were when she was a custodian, but her annual earnings rose from about $19,800 to $20,200.

"I look at it like this: God closed one door, but he opened up a bigger and better door," Thomas said.