The Los Angeles City Council finalized and approved a revised version of Mayor Karen Bass’ $13.9 billion budget proposal Friday for this coming fiscal year.
The city currently faces a nearly $1 billion budget deficit caused by overspending, liability payouts, lower tax revenue, labor contracts, scheduled city official raises and fire recovery, among other factors, according to ABC7 LA.
“Los Angeles, we have a very difficult budget to balance,” Bass said in her State of the City address April 21.
The LA city budget funds a wide range of city operations and institutions, such as public safety – including LAPD and the LA Fire Department – and other essential services including public facilities and homelessness programs.
Lee Ohanian, a professor of economics, said the deficit is unprecedented and a major issue for the city.
“The budget has grown about 62% in the last 10 years, which is a lot,” he added. “We would like to think that 62% growth over 10 years would be able to be enough to run a city of the size of Los Angeles.”
Ohanian said he believes the deficit exists for a myriad of reasons – including inefficiencies and poorly executed investments, such as recent projects to combat homelessness.
Bass’ original budget proposed an initial layoff of 1,647 city employees to reduce the deficit. However, the council voted 11-2 to reduce the layoffs to around 700 workers.
Instead, the council lowered funding for LAPD recruiting, giving the agency the money to hire 240 new officers – half of what Bass originally proposed and the lowest number of officers LAPD has had since 1995.
The council also scaled back Bass’ public safety initiative, curbing her proposed 227 new hires for LAFD to 58.
Ohanian said he believes LA should prioritize its fire and police departments.
“The fires that broke out in January may have been able to have been contained much earlier if there had been investments in fire protection,” he added. “We haven’t spent enough time or spent enough investment on fire.”
[Related: LA City Council rejects former LAFD chief Kristen Crowley’s appeal for restoration]
Two council members – John Lee and Traci Park – opposed the revised budget, citing concerns over budget reductions for LAPD and LAFD. Councilmembers Nithya Raman and Monica Rodriguez were absent during the vote. Rodriguez had previously voted against the revised budget at the original budget council meeting May 22.
“I just can’t in good conscience vote for a budget that makes our city less safe, less physically sound and even less responsive to our constituents,” Park said in an interview with the LA Times.
Even with the cuts, LAFD would still see an overall increase in funding under the council’s budget, Councilmember Tim McOsker said in an interview with LA Times. Putting more money into the two public safety departments would mean laying off other city of LA public service staff, he added.
Zev Yaroslavsky, a former council member and the director of the LA Initiative at the Luskin School of Public Affairs, said giving the two public safety agencies an exemption from budget cuts – as Bass proposed in her budget – would use up 70% of the city budget, leaving about $4 billion for the rest of the city’s departments.
“What’s the consequence of that?” he said. “Every service other than police and fire that you can imagine is going to be impacted: library services, parks and recreation services, street repair, street lighting, all of the services … that a municipality delivers are up for grabs.”
Ohanian said Bass should examine how other large cities in the United States have operated efficiently with smaller expenditures.
“It really boils down to efficiency and making sure that the people in Los Angeles feel like they’re getting benefits from the tax dollars they’re spending,” he added.
The newly revised budget also restored funding for street repairs and positions at the Department of Cultural Affairs, moved $5 million into the animal services department, allocated funds to operate the Climate Emergency Mobilization Office and provided $1 million for RepresentLA – an organization that supplies legal representation to immigrants facing deportation.
The budget will now be sent back to Bass for her consideration.
“They’re going to have a hard time balancing that budget without some significant sacrifices on the part of city employees, the city organization services to the public and potential fee increases to the public,” Yaroslavsky said. “Everything has got to be on the table. Everybody’s got to be part of the solution, or the city will not have a balanced budget.”
Comments are closed.