In a 12-3 vote, the Los Angeles City Council passed a $12.8 billion city budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year on Thursday.
The city is facing a projected $400 million deficit in the coming year, and tax revenue is down because of the real estate transfer tax. On top of that, the pay raises negotiated this fiscal year for thousands of city employees – totaling $412 million – is a new cost the council had to consider in the budget.
“I must recognize that this crisis is one of our own making. We did this to the city, we did it. This is not just a function of lower than expected revenues, and we haven't arrived here overnight,” said Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez. “This is the result of approving a contract last year that added a billion dollars over four years and raises for police officers despite knowing, and we knew this because we talked about it, that it would result in exactly the budget crunch that we're currently facing.”
This is the second year in a row Hernandez voted no on the city budget. This year, Councilmembers Hugo Soto-Martinez and Nithya Raman also voted against the budget.
City councilmember Bob Blumenfield agreed with Hernandez’s point on contract negotiations.
“When we made the decisions about not just the police contract, but all the other labor contracts, we limited our choices. That set the tone for all of our labor negotiations moving forward because folks see the contract that what the police had and the fire department wants and our coalition wants and part of our job as councilmembers, we need to stabilize our workforce, our biggest expense and the biggest driver. What makes this city great is our workers,” he said.
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Blumenfield said the bright spot in this budget is the lack of layoffs.. However, roughly 2,000 vacant positions will be cut from the city’s budget.
The budget received negative feedback from residents during public comment in Wednesday’s meeting. About 100 Angelenos showed up to voice their opinions, with many raising concerns about the cuts to daily services and social programs.
There’s no cushion for the city in the budget, so if there’s an unexpected expense – like a recession or major disaster – L.A. will have a difficult time finding money for it.
The budget will now head to Mayor Karen Bass for her signature or veto. This budget has to be adopted before the start of the next fiscal year, which starts on July 1.
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