Brianna Lee
is LAist’s Civics and Democracy engagement producer, focusing on making local government accessible.
Published July 1, 2025 5:00 AM
Mayor Karen Bass proposed budget that includes 1,600 layoffs.
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Topline:
L.A. Mayor Karen Bass signed a $14 billion spending plan for the upcoming fiscal year that includes more than 600 layoffs and spending cuts across departments. This budget is made up of your tax money, but you aren’t paying less in taxes — what’s changing is how that money’s being spent and what services you get in return. Try our calculator to see what your personal contribution will look like this year.
How does it work? Input the amount of property tax you pay in a year (we have instructions on how to figure that out), and it’ll break down how much is budgeted to various city departments for the upcoming fiscal year, compared to what was spent this year.
Why it matters: The L.A. city government’s financial crisis is fueled in part by overspending. Better understanding how the city government handled its money — and where your taxes fit into it — is one of the biggest ways residents can start to hold leaders accountable.
Read on … to try the calculator for yourself.
L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and the City Council approved a $14 billion spending plan for the upcoming fiscal year, which starts in July and runs through June 2026. It eliminates hundreds of city jobs and reduces spending across a large swath of city departments, though it shifts some of the cuts Bass originally proposed in April.
L.A. residents foot this bill through a combination of property taxes, sales taxes, utility taxes, permit fees, parking tickets and more. Property taxes are the biggest share of the city’s revenue, making up 20% of the general fund that’s used to pay for most services — homeowners and renters contribute to this, since renters likely help their landlords pay this tax through their rent.
The taxes you pay to the city aren’t going down. What’s changing is how they’re being spent, and what kind of services you’re getting in return.
Try our calculator below to find out how much you’re personally contributing to fund city services this year, and how it compares to how your money was spent last year. It’ll give you an approximation of how your property tax dollars get allocated according to the city’s budget.
How it works
Put the amount of property tax you pay each year into the calculator to see your results. It’s not a complete estimate of how much you pay for city services, since it doesn’t factor in contributions like sales taxes or parking meter fees, but it’s the simplest way to get an idea of what your receipt looks like. Know that your actual total contribution is likely higher than what this calculator shows.
The median property tax bill in L.A. is $5,438 per year, according to the Tax Foundation. When in doubt, use this number in the calculator.
To get a more precise figure, you can look up a property tax bill by address with the following steps:
Find the number on the top right that corresponds with General Tax Levy. This is the portion that goes to city and county general funds. Use this number in our calculator below. If you’re in a large apartment building, this number is going to be pretty big. You can divide it by the number of units in your building to estimate your contribution.
How we put this tool together
LAist relied on the city of L.A.’s adopted budget for fiscal year 2025-2026 (made up of the mayor’s proposal and the City Council’s final changes), which includes the amounts budgeted for the upcoming fiscal year as well as expenditure estimates for the current fiscal year, which runs through June 30.
First, we determined what percentage of the city’s general fund came from property tax dollars, and then what percentage of each department’s budget came from the general fund. We used these same percentage formulas to break down your property tax bill for this calculator.
More on how the city spends its money
Wondering what discussions led to some of these budget decisions?
The $1 billion deficit the city faces this year comes after the devastation of the Palisades Fire, expected cuts in federal funding and soaring payouts for liability claims.
The L.A. Police Department has been a major focal point of the City Council’s budget discussions, as it receives the largest share of city funds but struggles to hire its target number of sworn officers. Bass also faced scrutiny over funding for the L.A. Fire Department after its former chief publicly criticized funding cuts in the wake of the Palisades Fire. Liability payouts have climbed year after year, reaching more than $300 million this year. Meanwhile, departments like the Bureau of Sanitation and Bureau of Street Lighting are proposing raising other fees to fund their services as city finances get tighter.
Here’s more context behind some of these figures along with LAist’s recent reporting on city department budgets.
About 280 civilian LAPD jobs will be eliminated in the new budget.
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Police
The Police Department receives more city funding than any other department. More than 95% of its budget comes from the general fund.
The number of sworn police officers has been falling in recent years. Today there are about 8,700 sworn officers, down from roughly 10,000 before the COVID-19 pandemic.
During the 2025 budget negotiation process, Bass clashed with the City Council over how much funding to allocate for hiring new recruits. Ultimately, the 2025-26 plan allows for hiring an additional 240 new officers, and the City Council agreed to find funding to hire an additional 240. The plan keeps the current number of sworn officers stable when accounting for employee attrition.
About 280 civilian jobs will be eliminated, including specialists who analyze DNA evidence.
Although the number of sworn officers has declined, their pay has gone up. In an effort to boost recruitment, Bass in 2023 supported officer salary hikes worth $1 billion over four years, a deal the L.A. City Council approved. The raises are guaranteed under a contract with the police officers’ union that expires in 2027.
The Fire Department’s budget has been a topic of conversation since the Palisades Fire erupted in January. (The LAFD was not in charge of fighting the Eaton Fire, which burned the unincorporated area of Altadena. That was managed by the L.A. County Fire Department.) This department’s budget comes almost entirely from the general fund, with less than 1% coming from a half-cent sales tax all Californians pay for local public safety agencies.
Before the fires broke out, then-L.A. Fire Chief Kristin Crowley had warned that the department was understaffed and that emergency services were suffering. With just under one firefighter per 1,000 residents, the LAFD is among the smallest fire departments per capita of any major city. Response times have also increased in recent years as the city’s population has grown.
The L.A. City Council approved a labor contract in 2024 that boosted firefighter pay and funded new equipment, but Crowley said that wasn’t enough to address understaffing.
The adopted budget for 2025-26 increases the department’s budget to add 58 new positions and purchase new fire trucks. However, District 11 Councilmember Traci Park, one of three council members who voted against the budget, said it still wasn’t enough to meet the department’s day-to-day needs.
One of L.A.’s biggest costs is its annual contribution to retirement and pension funds for city employees, which come from the general fund. For the fiscal year ending this June, the city paid $1.42 billion — about 17.9% of the general fund — to cover those payments, plus some short-term borrowing costs to cover cash flow gaps. Sworn police and fire employees receive the biggest portion of these pension funds. That funding level remains roughly flat in the upcoming fiscal year’s budget, even accounting for impending job cuts.
In 2024, L.A. city voters passed Measure FF, which raised the overall cost of pensions. It allowed about 460 park rangers, port police and other peace officers the option to move from the civilian pension system to the more generous plan reserved for fire and police officers. An analysis from the city administrative officer said the measure would cost the general fund a $23 million one-time payment and about $1 million annually.
When the stock market performs poorly, the city has to contribute more of your tax money to pension funds to make sure pension recipients get what they’re owed. That’s one of many ways the national economic outlook will have a big impact on L.A.’s finances in the years to come.
The dollar amount shown in this calculator represents only a few of the city’s services for unhoused people that aren’t part of other departments’ costs, including Inside Safe, Bass’ initiative to move thousands of unhoused Angelenos to temporary hotels and motels while they await permanent housing, and CIRCLE, a crisis response program that sends mental health workers to respond to nonviolent calls involving unhoused people.
This figure for the 2025-26 fiscal year reflects about $41 million of projected spending on homelessness out of about $350 million budgeted for homeless services from city funds.
The homelessness spending not reflected here also includes city department funds for homelessness-specific services — for example, job support programs for unhoused people through the Economic and Workforce Development Department’s budget, or park encampment cleanup resources through the Recreation and Parks Department’s budget.
The city budgeted another $602 million in homelessness spending this upcoming year to come from state and federal grants as well as taxes or bonds that L.A. city voters passed. (That’s Measure ULA, which sets aside 4% of L.A. city property sales of more than $5 million and allocates them to homeless services, and Proposition HHH, which authorized the city to borrow $1.2 billion to build 10,000 units of housing over a decade.)
The city also contributes money to the joint city-county agency Los Angeles Housing Services Authority, or LAHSA, for its services including the annual Homeless Count, street outreach and case managers for placing unhoused people into available housing. L.A. County lawmakers recently voted to withdraw its funding for LAHSA and create a new county-run agency. L.A. City Council members are exploring the possibility of pulling funding for LAHSA as well. This year’s signed budget for the coming fiscal year slightly increases spending on homelessness by 0.2%.
This year, the city of L.A. is expected to pay more than $300 million to settle claims and lawsuits against the city for wrongdoing. It’s more than triple the amount the city budgeted for liability claims.
That budget remained at $87 million for the past five years despite payouts regularly amounting to double or triple that amount. The budget for the upcoming fiscal year ends that trend, raising the budget to $187 million — more than double that of the previous year, but still not near the $300 million expected to be spent this year.
Some of the most expensive settlements include claims over housing discrimination, police use of force and injuries caused by decaying city infrastructure.
L.A. residents will see their trash fees rise in coming years.
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Sanitation
Only about 13% of the Bureau of Sanitation’s funding comes from the general fund in the upcoming budget. A large portion of the rest comes from fees that residents pay for trash, recycling, water usage and other services.
The department has been facing staffing shortages and budget gaps, which is why earlier this year it asked the L.A. City Council to raise trash collection fees. The rate increase was approved, and customers will see trash rates rise through 2029.
If the figure shown in this calculator seems small, that’s because it’s not the full amount we actually pay for street lighting services.
Most of this department’s budget comes from a property tax that’s specifically for street lighting. If you pull up your property tax bill (see instructions near the top of this story), you’ll see a section called “Direct Assessments.” Underneath that is a line for “City Lt Maint” — that’s most of what you’re contributing to this department’s services.
This fee hasn’t increased since the late 1990s. That has put stress on the department’s budget, which is also seeing rising costs due to copper wire thefts and frequent outages.
Last year’s budget eliminated about 17% of positions from the Bureau of Street Lighting, which were vacant at the time. The adopted budget for 2025-26 cuts it by another 7%.
The Los Angeles Official Martin Luther King Day Parade will take Monday in South L.A. So, whether you’re attending the parade or watching it on TV, here’s everything you need to know about Monday’s parade.
The details: The procession will begin at 10 a.m., with ABC7 set to begin a broadcast at 11 a.m. Organizers say the best place to catch the parade in person is the intersection of Crenshaw Boulevard and Martin Luther King Jr. King Boulevard, or “camera corner,” where the parade will culminate and organizers are planning a live preshow. Bleacher seats, though, will be limited.
Getting there: The Metro K Line runs directly to the intersection, dropping people off at the Martin Luther King Jr. Metro station. Only residents will be allowed to drive into the band of neighborhoods directly along the length of the parade route. That includes the blocks from 39th Street to 42nd Street along King Boulevard and the blocks between McClung Drive and Victoria Avenue along the Crenshaw closure.
Read on . . . for more information about street closures and the annual MLK Freedom Festival.
In just four days, the Los Angeles Official Martin Luther King Day Parade will take over South L.A.
The LA Local recently spoke with Sabra Wady, the parade’s lead organizer, who said this year’s parade will look much the same as recent years.
So, whether you’re attending the parade or watching it on TV, here’s everything you need to know about Monday’s parade:
What time does the parade start? How can I watch? Is anything happening after?
Wady said the best place to catch the parade in person is the intersection of Crenshaw Boulevard and Martin Luther King Jr. King Boulevard, or “camera corner,” where the parade will culminate and organizers are planning a live preshow. Bleacher seats, though, will be limited.
The Metro K Line runs directly to the intersection, dropping people off at the Martin Luther King Jr. Metro station.
Onlookers can also post up along the parade route with folding chairs and other self-arranged seating, Wady said.
The parade broadcast will run until 1 p.m., but Wady said the procession is expected to keep going until mid-afternoon.
“After the cameras stop rolling, it’s the people’s parade,” Wady said.
LA City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson and Councilmembers Curren Price and Heather Hutt – who represent council districts 8, 9 and 10, respectively — will organize the annual MLK Freedom Festival in the Leimert Park Plaza from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
What route will the parade take?
The route will remain the same, running down King Boulevard from Western Avenue to Crenshaw Boulevard before turning south down Crenshaw and heading to Leimert Park. Much of the route will be closed to traffic overnight before the parade.
More than 150 groups, including bands, floats, horseback riders and marchers, will trek down the boulevard. Wady said organizers cut off new sign-ups weeks ago in order to keep the parade manageable.
What will road closures look like?
Colin Sweeney, a spokesperson for the LA Department of Transportation, said in an email that the department will close off traffic down the main parade route overnight.
Here are the roads that will be closed to all vehicles for the duration of the parade and festival.
King Boulevard from Vermont Avenue to Crenshaw Boulevard
Crenshaw Boulevard from King Boulevard to 48th Street
Leimert Boulevard from 8th Avenue to Leimert Park
Degnan Avenue between 43rd Street and Leimert Park
Sweeney said only residents will be allowed to drive into the band of neighborhoods directly along the length of the parade route. That includes the blocks from 39th Street to 42nd Street along King Boulevard and the blocks between McClung Drive and Victoria Avenue along the Crenshaw closure.
The transportation department will allow traffic to cross the parade route at major intersections — including Western Avenue, Arlington Avenue and Stocker Street — but those crossings will be shut down at 10 a.m. All closed roads will stay blocked off until the parade and festival wrap up and transportation officials determine crowds have sufficiently dispersed, Sweeney said.
Wady said the parade is expected to peter out around mid-afternoon. The festival at Leimert Park Plaza is scheduled to end at 5 p.m.
Vehicles parked in the parade assembly area, parade route and disbanding area will be subject to impound or tickets, Sweeney wrote.
A film crew works on the set of author Michael Connelly's "Bosch," shooting in the San Fernando Valley. On-location film shoots in the last three months of 2025 rose 5.6% but were 16.1% lower overall during the year than in 2024.
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Topline:
On-location filming in L-A increased over the last three months of 2025 but still lagged behind where it was at the end of 2024, according to an end-of-year report from Film L.A., the official filming office for the city and county.
By the numbers: Film and television shoot days total 4,625 in the final three months of 2025, up 5.1 percent in that timeframe. But overall last year there were 19,694 shoot days, which is down 16.1 percent from 2024's total of 23.480.
Why it matters: Production in Los Angeles has been slow to rebound since the COVID-19 pandemic and the Hollywood writers and actors strikes in 2023. There is also increased competition from other states that offer appealing film tax credits and other incentives for productions that decide to take their shoot outside of California. This summer, Governor Gavin Newsom expanded California's Film and TV Tax Credit Program in an effort to lure productions back to the Golden State.
What's next: Film L.A.'s Phil Sokoloski says that many of the productions approved under the expanded tax credit program are just now getting underway, and he hopes the industry will start to see the effects of not only the tax incentive expansion in 2026, but also L.A. Mayor Karen Bass' directives to streamline the permitting and shooting process in the city.
Topline:
On-location filming in L.A. increased over the last three months of 2025 but still lagged behind where it was at the end of 2024, according to an end-of-year report from Film L.A., the official filming office for the city and county.
By the numbers: Film and television shoot days totaled 4,625 in the final three months of 2025, up 5.1% in that timeframe. But overall last year, there were 19,694 shoot days, which is down 16.1% from 2024's total of 23.480.
Why it matters: Production in Los Angeles has been slow to rebound since the COVID-19 pandemic and the Hollywood writers and actors strikes in 2023. There is also increased competition from other states that offer appealing film tax credits and other incentives for productions that decide to take their shoot outside of California. This summer, Gov. Gavin Newsom expanded California's Film and TV Tax Credit Program in an effort to lure productions back to the Golden State.
What's next: Film L.A.'s Phil Sokoloski says that many of the productions approved under the expanded tax credit program are just now getting underway, and he hopes the industry will start to see the effects of not only the tax incentive expansion in 2026, but also L.A. Mayor Karen Bass' directives to streamline the permitting and shooting process in the city.
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Kavish Harjai
is covering general and breaking news the week of Jan. 19.
Published January 16, 2026 2:39 PM
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. waves to supporters during the March on Washington on Aug. 28, 1963.
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Topline:
In L.A., there is no shortage of events to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, observed this year on January 19.
Events at California African American Museum: The California African American Museum is hosting a King Day scavenger hunt on Sunday from 2 to 3 p.m.. On Monday, it is hosting an all-day event honoring the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. that will culminate with a performance by the Inner City Youth Orchestra of L.A., which is billed as the largest majority Black youth orchestra in the country.
Orchestra at Skirball: The orchestra will also perform at the Skirball Cultural Center on Saturday evening. The free event is already at capacity, but you can try your luck by signing up for the waitlist here. Earlier Saturday, the orchestra will join the Santa Monica Symphony for its annual MLK concert.
Read on ... for more events to choose from.
In L.A., there is no shortage of events to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day this year.
The California African American Museum is hosting a King Day scavenger hunt on Sunday from 2 to 3 p.m. On Monday, it is hosting an all-day event honoring King that will culminate with a performance by the Inner City Youth Orchestra of L.A., which is billed as the largest majority Black youth orchestra in the country.
Orchestra at Skirball
The orchestra will also perform at the Skirball Cultural Center on Saturday evening. The free event is already at capacity, but you can try your luck by signing up for the waitlist here. Earlier Saturday, the orchestra will join the Santa Monica Symphony for its annual MLK concert.
Parades and celebrations
Cedric the Entertainer will be the grand marshal of this year’s official L.A. MLK Day Parade on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard between Western and Crenshaw avenues on Monday. If you’re looking for a parade earlier in the weekend, you can head to Long Beach’s MLK Day parade on Saturday. Also on Saturday is a celebration of King’s legacy at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Culver City.
Volunteer opportunities
In 1994, President Bill Clinton officially decreed MLK Day as a day of service. If you’re looking for opportunities to volunteer, grab free tickets to Monday’s MLK Day Volunteer Festival at the L.A. Memorial Coliseum.
Free access to state parks
Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Friday that more than 200 California state parks will be free to enter on Monday. The move comes after the Trump administration eliminated MLK Day and Juneteenth from the list of days when it’s free to access national parks. There are 12 free state parks on the list in L.A. County, including Los Angeles and Will Rogers State Historic Parks, as well as Topanga and Malibu Creek State Parks. See the full list here.
Monica Bushman
produces arts and culture coverage for LAist's on-demand team. She’s also part of the Imperfect Paradise podcast team.
Published January 16, 2026 2:30 PM
Lawrence Shou and Lucy Liu in a scene from 'Rosemead.'
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Topline:
The new movie Rosemead, starring Lucy Liu, is based on a 2017 Los Angeles Times article about the tragic story of a terminally ill woman who killed her 18-year-old son, who’d been diagnosed with schizophrenia.
The context: It’s a carefully reported story by journalist Frank Shyong about a family, about the shame and stigma that can surround mental illness in Asian American communities, and how media portrayals of people with mental disorders can perpetuate harmful misconceptions.
Shyong had some concerns when he was first approached about the idea of adapting the story into a narrative film, but found that it ended up "sort of completing the circle a little bit. It added parts to the story that I wanted to see depicted."
Read on ... for more about the true story behind 'Rosemead.'
A 2017 Los Angeles Times article tells the tragic story of Lai Hang, a terminally ill woman who killed her 18-year-old son George, who’d been diagnosed with schizophrenia.
It’s a carefully reported story by journalist Frank Shyong about a family, about the shame and stigma that can surround mental illness in Asian American communities, and how media portrayals of people with mental disorders can perpetuate harmful misconceptions.
So when Shyong was first approached about the idea of adapting the story he wrote into a narrative film, he had some “very intense” concerns about whether a film would get the story right.
But after conversations with the filmmakers, and thinking through the potential value of telling fictionalized stories based on real-life events, Shyong says, “ I think I realized that my story was in a lot of ways incomplete.”
Nine years later, the film, titled Rosemead, is finished. Directed by Eric Lin and written by Marilyn Fu, the film stars Lucy Liu as Irene, a character based on Hang, and Lawrence Shou as Joe, who’s based on George.
And Shyong, who is credited as an executive producer and served as a consultant on the film, says “it’s sort of completing the circle a little bit” — fleshing out Hang and George as “full 360 degree human beings” and giving glimpses of how their story might have ended differently.
Reporting on trauma in Asian American communities
Back in 2015, when the events depicted in Rosemead happened, the breaking news coverage revealed the basics of what was known at the time — that a woman had fatally shot her son in a Rosemead motel and turned herself in.
“ I think a lot of people probably realized there was more story there,” Shyong says. But the only person who knew the details, Hang’s longtime friend Ping Chong, had declined to talk to the media.
Still, Shyong kept following up because the court records hinted at a story that he thought should be told.
The court records revealed that Hang had been dying of cancer, and that Chong continued to visit her after she turned herself in, performing Buddhist rituals for her.
“Just knowing those two facts,” Shyong says, “and knowing Asian American families, and how complete and terrifying the sense of responsibility that a parent can feel toward a child, I just thought there's gotta be something there.”
He would visit Chong’s shop, a traditional Chinese pharmacy, leaving notes for her and talking to her about why he wanted to know more. And he gained her trust.
”You just have to say, ‘This is [the] story I think is here. And do you think that story is true? And if so, can you help me tell it?’ And that's all I did,” Shyong says. “I think that's all any journalist ever does.”
It’s a story that Shyong says he would come to learn is more common than many may expect. “When you are a caregiver in these communities,” Shyong says, “you can find and name a tragic story like this in probably every zip code.”
How filmmaking and journalism can complement each other
Shyong’s article ends with this poignant quote from Chong, about her friend: “People will only know her as the mother who killed her son [...] But she was more.”
The piece itself goes a long way toward dispelling Chong’s concern, including details about Hang’s life — that she was a talented graphic designer, that she was “beautiful, smart and ambitious,” that she’d lost her husband to cancer, and that she deeply cared about her son.
But “in this case fiction,” Shyong says, “could give closure to characters in a way that I couldn't in reality. It could tell the fullness of this family story.”
The film shows Liu’s character Irene having fun with her son at the beach, and joining his therapy sessions at the urging of a psychiatrist, despite being visibly uncomfortable doing so.
It shows George (Joe in the film) with his friends, who come to visit him after he has an intense schizophrenic episode at school.
The sound design gives a sense of what it’s like to experience schizophrenia, and a part of the film where Joe runs away shows how quickly a boy with a mother and friends who care about him can become an unhoused person who someone might fear on the street.
Ultimately, the film ends on a note of hope, which grew out of something that Shyong learned from Chong after the article was published. In a way that he couldn’t do in print, “It added parts to the story that I wanted to see depicted.”
