Karen Bass released her projected $14 billion budget April 20, and Valley News Group asked her point blank, what’s in it for the valley?
The Valley, with 1.8 million residents, makes up half the population of the city, but often feels shortchanged by City Hall. “I lived in the Valley at one point,” said Bass. “So I know that the Valley often feels like a stepchild. But I’ve tried to pay attention since I’ve been in office. I established a Valley advisory council, and we’re addressing the issues of valley residents.”
Valley News Group asked her specifically about the biggest problems facing valley residents and businesses – crime, city services, the homeless and fire.
LAPD captains have told us they don’t have enough officers or cars to patrol their large districts. We questioned the hiring of only 510 new recruits under the 2026 budget.
Bass said first that she is working on the recent crime spikes – which seem to be coming more from domestic gangs than “burglary tourists” from other countries. “I’ve deployed extra resources, from helicopters to drones to mounted patrol. We lead a full court press when there’s a crime spike,” she said.
On what appears to be a small number of new police hires in the budget, Police Protective League rep Thomas Saggau told Valley News Group, “That number is pretty important. Last year it was 480. We support the budget and 510 – the perspective is how many we can reasonably get through the academy. I think if everything went well we couldn’t fill more than 500.”
Valley News Group asked Bass what city services will go to the valley in the new budget, since residents have just been hit with a street light assessment. “It’s taken me a while but we’ve solved that problem. The theft of copper wire means we couldn’t get ahead of replacing them. We are installing 60,000 solar lights in the Valley. Also going to expand Monica Rodriguez’ pilot program that has at-risk use fixing sidewalks and take it city-wide.”
A constant worry to valley residents are the homeless encampments and continuing fires in the Sepulveda Basin, which Bass addressed. “Residents came to me in fear of fires – it’s a hot spot for Encino especially. We had a massive intervention with the Army Corps of Engineers, LAPD, basic city services and community-based organizations like Chrysalis to clean out the brush and the camps. It a huge property and a huge job but we’ve made inroads – and I hired the goats!”
Bass has faced repeated criticism for her handling of the Palisades and Altadena fires, and we questioned why the budget only holds static the number of firefighters.
Matt Hale, the mayor’s budget director, explained that there is a measure on the ballot in November that will dramatically increase the number. If they add more positions now, the ballot measure won’t pay for them on an ongoing basis.
One LAPD captain we interviewed said that, “30% of crime and 80% of fires are started by drug-addicted or mentally ill homeless,” saying “You never see a corporate exec who’s been laid off and homeless lighting a fire.”
Valley News Group asked Bass how can we get not just housing, but more services to the homeless under her whopping $788 million budget allocation for homeless. Hale explained that the $788 was not all general fund money – some is from grants funded by the states and some is from Measure A.
And Bass said, “It drives me crazy. The city and county have approached homeless issues doing the same thing – wedded to the ideology that all a homeless person needs is a home. If you think that just giving them housing is the answer you’re wrong. We need to provide the services. The dysfunctional model we’ve used for the last 30 years is completely dependent on the county. I hope to pull services out of the county into the city. In three years my number one goal has been to get people off the street. If we house them in a cost-effective way it costs more money to leave them on the street in terms of police, fire and medical calls. Get rid of the camps, you get rid of the calls. Now I’m ready to move to the next phase and deal with substance, social and economic issues.”
