The Brief

Four months into the fiscal year, the city of Los Angeles has already overspent its budget by nearly $300 million, according to a report released this week by the City Administrative Officer.

The city is in “a particularly challenging financial position,” the report states, noting increased legal liability and labor costs across a number of departments.

L.A.'s reserve fund has dropped to 4% of revenues, according to the report. The city has a policy of keeping the fund at a minimum of 5%. If it drops below 2.75%, the council would need a two-thirds vote to withdraw money from it. That could threaten the city’s bond rating, which would increase the city’s borrowing costs.

“The warning alarms are appropriately going off,” said Bob Blumenfield, chair of the City Council Budget Committee. He said cuts in city services would likely be needed to address the problem in the $12.8 billion budget.

“We’re talking about slowing down the hiring, which has real impacts on services,” he said. “We’re talking about asking departments to absorb some of these deficits within their departments, which also has an impact on services.”

Where did the money go?

More than a third of the overspending is related to increased legal payouts to people who’ve sued the city. The city has overspent its liability claims account by $112 million — more than twice what was budgeted for the entire year.

“It’s pretty stunning to see how quickly we've blown through that money,” said Rob Quan of Unrig LA, a watchdog group.

Legal liabilities include court judgments and legal settlements involving police abuse or negligence, which accounts for 40% of all payouts, but also for things like traffic collisions involving city vehicles and slip and fall lawsuits involving buckled city sidewalks.

Blumenfield blamed the current legal climate on the rising costs of judgments and settlements.

“Juries — not just in Los Angeles, but across the nation — are coming back with much higher judgments and of course that has a ripple effect on the settlements,” he said.

He also said cases slowed by COVID’s impact on the courts are just now getting settled.

“The George Floyd cases are coming due,” said Blumenfield, referring to police abuse cases that occurred during massive street protests in 2020 following the murder of Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.

Deferred maintenance has played a role, too. “Our sidewalks haven’t been getting better in the last several years, they’ve been getting worse, which means there are more trip and falls,” Blumenfield said.

He predicted legal payouts would be near $300 million by the end of the year.

How will the city cover costs?

The CAO has recommended borrowing up to $80 million to cover some of the legal costs. The move would help with the short term problem, but increase the city’s debt.

Blumenfield said service cuts would likely be necessary, too.

“There’s not a lot of fluff for departments to make cuts that they need to make without impacting services,” he said.

The report identified overspending in a wide range of departments. The Fire Department led the way with more than $90 million in overspending due largely to a new labor contract. Firefighters are getting an annual 3% increase to their base wages, totaling 12% by Fiscal Year 2027-28. They’ll also see a 5% annual increase to their health benefits.

The labor contract mirrored similar agreements with other city unions that the city signed last fiscal year. Each contract continues to weigh on the current budget.

Other departments that overspent include the city attorney ($25 million) police ($20 million) and transportation ($14 million). The rising cost of gasoline was among the reasons cited.

On the bright side, the CAO noted general fund revenue is up $54 million. But he cautioned city leaders against counting on revenues to continue to be higher than anticipated.

“Forecasts specific to the state and local economy predict subpar economic growth throughout 2024 and increasing unemployment with indicators not anticipated to improve until the end of 2025,” the report stated.

The City Council Budget, Finance and Innovation committee will consider the report at a meeting Wednesday at 2:30 p.m. You can view the committee's agenda and watch the meeting live here.

The Los Angeles Unified School District is officially on the hook for providing high-dosage tutoring to students after a judge approved a settlement reached last fall.

After being accused of denying students their right to equitable education during pandemic shutdowns, the district must now provide 100,000 students — more than a quarter of the district’s TK-12 students — with three years of high-dosage tutoring under a court-approved settlement, amounting to more than 10 million hours. District staff and outside vendors will provide students with a mix of virtual and in-person sessions.

“The District is conducting a program evaluation of the tutoring program, which will explore variation in the implementation, take-up, and impact on student outcomes across a range of tutoring models and vendors,” LAUSD said in a statement to EdSource.

The tutoring mandate stems from a court-approved settlement reached in October and finalized last month in Shaw et al. v. LAUSD et al., a lawsuit filed during the Covid-19 pandemic that alleged that only 60% of the district’s students participated in virtual instruction during the spring 2020 semester, denying them “basic educational equality guaranteed to them by the California Constitution.”

LAUSD would continue to use its already existing high-dose tutoring eligibility criteria to determine which students receive the support. The district did not specify how it would measure the program’s success.

The settlement 

The high-dosage tutoring that Los Angeles Unified maintains it has been providing relies on money from the Expanded Learning Opportunities Program (ELOP). The lawsuit, which includes other supports outlined in the settlement, gained final approval on Feb. 18 and is intended to help close learning gaps and improve academic performance.

The method specifically caters to students’ individual needs and provides either small group or one-on-one support that complements what they learn in the classroom, according to the National Student Support Accelerator at Stanford University.

“Evidence does suggest that that kind of effort would boost student outcomes,” said Morgan Polikoff, a USC professor of education.

“But I think it’s not likely to fully solve the problem, both because it’s missing a portion of the student population — a pretty sizable one — and also because I don’t know if that’s enough hours to solve the problem,” he said, referring to the fact that only a quarter of the student population will receive these services.

Ned Hillenbrand, a partner with Kirkland & Ellis LLP and one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs, emphasized the importance of accountability moving forward.

“Our families understood that these issues affected students across the district. They admirably pursued remedial programs for those students as well as their own children,” Hillenbrand said in the statement.

“Now that the court has approved the settlement, our goal is to hold LAUSD accountable and to maximize the benefits students receive during the three-year enforcement period.”

Challenges with access  

After the pandemic hit, Judith Larson, a plaintiff in the case, said she waited six months for a school computer to arrive, navigated connectivity challenges and even paid out of pocket for tutoring for her daughter. And one of the mentors struggled to help because she learned math in an entirely different way.

Aida Vega found it difficult to access LAUSD’s tutoring services for her daughter, who struggled academically during the pandemic but eventually graduated. But Vega had to take on an extra job to pay for the support.

“I did have the opportunity as a mom to be able to help my student that year because it was just her at that moment. I paid for her,” she said in Spanish. “But other parents had three, four children in schools and didn’t have that opportunity to pay. And now those students aren’t studying.”

LAUSD’s tutoring webpage says schools will contact families whose students qualify, and that parents can contact their local school sites for more information.

But Walt Gersón Rodríguez, the vice president of Innovate Public Schools, which supported parents in the suit, emphasized the importance of improving access, so parents and students don’t have to embark on a “scavenger hunt” to find them.

“My concern would be that this information doesn’t reach the parents; their children don’t get the service and support,” Rodríguez said. “And then, we have another generation of students that either graduate or don’t graduate and don’t go on to college and get a job or career in a competitive economy that we have today.”

Despite LAUSD’s gains in standardized test scores, which showed students are performing better than they did prepandemic, Polikoff noted that students are still “behind where they would have been had Covid not happened.”

Rodríguez added that some graduates have struggled to meet A-G requirements, courses necessary for students to be eligible to attend University of California or California State University campuses, and are having a hard time getting into college or entering the workforce.

If it weren’t for the setbacks, Larson said her daughter would have loved to attend UCLA. But she still considers herself one of the fortunate ones.

“Many moms and dads that I know, that one [dream] we share is we need to do better and change for our children,” Larson said. “But here we are taking steps, one at a time.”

L.A., you have a big choice to make this year. Mayor Karen Bass is running for a second term in office, and there's a long list of others — including City Councilmember Nithya Raman, former reality star Spencer Pratt, community organizer Rae Huang and tech entrepreneur Adam Miller — lined up to run against her.

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The Los Angeles Unified School District is officially on the hook for providing high-dosage tutoring to students after a judge approved a settlement reached last fall.

After being accused of denying students their right to equitable education during pandemic shutdowns, the district must now provide 100,000 students — more than a quarter of the district’s TK-12 students — with three years of high-dosage tutoring under a court-approved settlement, amounting to more than 10 million hours. District staff and outside vendors will provide students with a mix of virtual and in-person sessions.

“The District is conducting a program evaluation of the tutoring program, which will explore variation in the implementation, take-up, and impact on student outcomes across a range of tutoring models and vendors,” LAUSD said in a statement to EdSource.

The tutoring mandate stems from a court-approved settlement reached in October and finalized last month in Shaw et al. v. LAUSD et al., a lawsuit filed during the Covid-19 pandemic that alleged that only 60% of the district’s students participated in virtual instruction during the spring 2020 semester, denying them “basic educational equality guaranteed to them by the California Constitution.”

LAUSD would continue to use its already existing high-dose tutoring eligibility criteria to determine which students receive the support. The district did not specify how it would measure the program’s success.

The settlement

The high-dosage tutoring that Los Angeles Unified maintains it has been providing relies on money from the Expanded Learning Opportunities Program (ELOP). The lawsuit, which includes other supports outlined in the settlement, gained final approval on Feb. 18 and is intended to help close learning gaps and improve academic performance.

The method specifically caters to students’ individual needs and provides either small group or one-on-one support that complements what they learn in the classroom, according to the National Student Support Accelerator at Stanford University.

“Evidence does suggest that that kind of effort would boost student outcomes,” said Morgan Polikoff, a USC professor of education.

“But I think it’s not likely to fully solve the problem, both because it’s missing a portion of the student population — a pretty sizable one — and also because I don’t know if that’s enough hours to solve the problem,” he said, referring to the fact that only a quarter of the student population will receive these services.

Ned Hillenbrand, a partner with Kirkland & Ellis LLP and one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs, emphasized the importance of accountability moving forward.

“Our families understood that these issues affected students across the district. They admirably pursued remedial programs for those students as well as their own children,” Hillenbrand said in the statement.

“Now that the court has approved the settlement, our goal is to hold LAUSD accountable and to maximize the benefits students receive during the three-year enforcement period.”

Challenges with access

After the pandemic hit, Judith Larson, a plaintiff in the case, said she waited six months for a school computer to arrive, navigated connectivity challenges and even paid out of pocket for tutoring for her daughter. And one of the mentors struggled to help because she learned math in an entirely different way.

Aida Vega found it difficult to access LAUSD’s tutoring services for her daughter, who struggled academically during the pandemic but eventually graduated. But Vega had to take on an extra job to pay for the support.

“I did have the opportunity as a mom to be able to help my student that year because it was just her at that moment. I paid for her,” she said in Spanish. “But other parents had three, four children in schools and didn’t have that opportunity to pay. And now those students aren’t studying.”

LAUSD’s tutoring webpage says schools will contact families whose students qualify, and that parents can contact their local school sites for more information.

But Walt Gersón Rodríguez, the vice president of Innovate Public Schools, which supported parents in the suit, emphasized the importance of improving access, so parents and students don’t have to embark on a “scavenger hunt” to find them.

“My concern would be that this information doesn’t reach the parents; their children don’t get the service and support,” Rodríguez said. “And then, we have another generation of students that either graduate or don’t graduate and don’t go on to college and get a job or career in a competitive economy that we have today.”

Despite LAUSD’s gains in standardized test scores, which showed students are performing better than they did prepandemic, Polikoff noted that students are still “behind where they would have been had Covid not happened.”

Rodríguez added that some graduates have struggled to meet A-G requirements, courses necessary for students to be eligible to attend University of California or California State University campuses, and are having a hard time getting into college or entering the workforce.

If it weren’t for the setbacks, Larson said her daughter would have loved to attend UCLA. But she still considers herself one of the fortunate ones.

“Many moms and dads that I know, that one [dream] we share is we need to do better and change for our children,” Larson said. “But here we are taking steps, one at a time.”

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday agreed to pay $4.9 million to settle four lawsuits by people who were injured in collisions with Sheriff’s Department patrol cars.

The payouts come amid increased scrutiny of crashes by law enforcement officers. It has emerged as a major national issue, with cities across the country paying out hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements and verdicts because of vehicle collisions involving officers, deputies or agents.

In the latest L.A. County payouts, tied to collisions that happened between 2018 and 2020, all plaintiffs said deputies were negligent when they crashed into their cars.

County supervisors settled the lawsuits during an open-session vote Tuesday. The county admitted no wrongdoing.

A collision in Paramount

Freddy Ontiveros and Antonio De La Cruz Zamora were hit from behind in 2018 in the city of Paramount, according to their lawsuit filed in Superior Court. They alleged in the suit that a sheriff’s deputy “rear ended the vehicle which was stopped behind plaintiff's vehicle, pushing the vehicle into plaintiff's vehicle causing plaintiff personal injuries and property damage.”

The deputy was responding to a call of a robbery in progress and had activated the lights and sirens on the vehicle.

A review of the Crash Data Retrieval system found the deputy was traveling south on Paramount Boulevard at 75 mph and slowed to 35 mph at the time of the collision, according to a corrective action plan presented to the board Tuesday.

“The collision investigation concluded that the deputy sheriff caused the collision as he was driving at an unsafe speed for traffic conditions,” the plan stated.

The case settled for $1.75 million.

Later, the Lakewood Sheriff’s Station — which covers Paramount — conducted a review of all traffic collisions for the calendar year 2020 through the end of 2024. The audit revealed there were 196 total collisions for this five-year period, 129 of which were classified as preventable and 67 classified as non-preventable.

“To improve employee safety and reduce the Department's liability and exposure, Lakewood supervisors continue to conduct bi-weekly briefings which focus on the importance of safe driving as well as abiding by all the rules of the road when operating county vehicles,” the plan stated.

Other collisions

In a separate incident, Shannon Story had a green light at Palmdale intersection on Oct. 27, 2019. According to her complaint, a deputy ran a red light and crashed into Story’s vehicle as she entered the intersection. The impact of the collision caused Story’s vehicle to crash into the corner wall of a 7-Eleven convenience store.

“Plaintiff sustained significant injuries as a result of the collision,” her complaint read. She settled the case for $1.2 million.

In another case filed by Jose Gaitan, he says a sheriff’s deputy in a department vehicle rear-ended his car. LAist was not immediately able to get further details on the crash. He settled for $450,000.

The summary corrective action plan for a fourth collision describes how a deputy was backing up to make contact with a suspect when he ran into a car driven by Alejandra Gonzalez. The deputy “reversed approximately two to three feet and collided into the Plaintiff’s vehicle at approximately 5-10 mph.”

Gonzalez settled for $1.5 million.