In her first State of the City speech, Mayor Karen Bass announced a dramatic expansion of her signature program to move homeless people indoors, while also pledging to transform the city into “a new L.A.”
Bass said she intends to propose $250 million for Inside Safe, which moves unhoused residents off sidewalks and into hotel and motel rooms, as part of a $1.3 billion investment in housing and homelessness programs — an amount she called “unprecedented,” according to a prepared copy of her speech, which began just after 6 p.m. Monday.
The mayor’s full spending plan, which will cover the year that starts July 1 and still requires city council approval, will be unveiled Tuesday morning.
In the four months since she took office, Bass has at times seemed like a single-issue mayor, focusing almost exclusively on homelessness. Monday’s speech foregrounded those efforts, while turning attention toward public safety and other topics.
Bass pledged to rebuild the depleted ranks of the Los Angeles Police Department, while also investing in a new Mayor’s Office of Community Safety, which will focus on unarmed responses to emergencies. The mayor’s speech touched on a laundry list of other topics, including climate change, paramedic response times, pothole repairs, vacancies in the city workforce and graffiti on freeways and in underpasses.
Depending on the specifics of her spending plan, the mayor’s proposed budget will likely exceed the dollar amount of the city’s previous efforts to address the city’s homelessness crisis. Two years ago, former Mayor Eric Garcetti used his own State of the City address to announce that he planned to spend nearly $1 billion to address the crisis, which has steadily grown over the past decade.
Speaking in City Hall’s council chambers to a packed room of civic and community leaders, Bass began by saying she could not declare that the state of the city “is where it needs to be,” according to a prepared copy of the speech. She proffered a vision of a metropolis defined by neighborhood-level issues that her administration is still working to improve.
The state of the city hinges largely on conditions in each neighborhood and each household in L.A., Bass said in her prepared remarks.
“Do you look over your shoulder when walking after dark? Do you feel pride in your local park? Do you have peace of mind because you can actually pay the rent? When the answer is yes, then we can say the state of our city is strong,” she said.
Since taking office in December, Bass has emphasized the need to work closely with other government agencies to solve homelessness and other regionwide problems, relying on the phrase “locking arms.” As part of that theme, Bass allowed leaders of the City Council and the County Board of Supervisors to speak at the event, when the mayor is typically the only speaker.
Council President Paul Krekorian and Board Chair Janice Hahn’s introductions were emblematic not just of Bass’ broader approach but also the realities of governing in Los Angeles, said Raphael Sonenshein, the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at Cal State LA.
“Any mayor is the most recognized political leader,” Sonenshein said. “But it’s really hard on some issues to get things done without the City Council, who elect the council president and, to some degree, the county supervisors whenever there’s social services involved, as would be the case on homelessness.”
It’s an understanding that Bass — a former Assembly speaker and six-term member of Congress — is deeply familiar with, and one that echoed throughout her speech in nods to her city and county colleagues, according to the prepared remarks.
“We have finally dispelled the myth that people do not want to come inside,” Bass said of her plans to scale up the Inside Safe pilot program, according to her prepared remarks.
Bass declared her plans to to rebuild the police department, saying she feared the department’s ranks might fall below 9,000 officers — a low not seen since 2002, according to the mayor. She promised an urgent new recruitment campaign aimed at hiring police officers, saying that financial incentives would be provided to city employees who help find recruits.
She also spoke of her plans for the new Mayor’s Office of Community Safety, saying it will “build capacity for community intervention workers, social workers, clinical psychologists and other experts to respond when law enforcement is not required.”
She acknowledged the ongoing problems at the city’s animal shelters by bluntly stating that the city’s care of the animals is “not working well,” according to the prepared remarks. She said her budget would include money for staff at the animal services department, and she praised the city’s “invaluable” shelter volunteers, saying the “shelters simply could not function” without them.
Bass also announced a plan to hire “hundreds” of Los Angeles city firefighters, according to her prepared remarks. She also plans to allow “qualified” paramedics to work immediately and complete their firefighter instruction later — a move meant to address the fact that the vast majority of Los Angeles Fire Department calls are for medical emergencies.
“We need more paramedics responding to 911 calls right now,” Bass said, according to the prepared remarks.
The audience for Bass’ first annual city address included her own family members, city managers, and community and business leaders. Before the event started, former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa — who has been advising Bass — shook hands with some in the crowd.
While Bass delivered her speech inside the council chamber, protesters stood outside City Hall holding banners urging the city to help the tenants of Hillside Villa, an apartment building in Chinatown where dozens of renters have been facing rent hikes. City officials have been exploring whether to purchase that building for two years.
