Police vs. firefighters: Bitter $350M tax war erupts after years of LA City Hall failures

Police officers vs.firefighters.

It’s not the annual softball game.It’s a serious political fight over a proposed half-cent per dollar sales tax in the city of LA.The LA firefighters union, United Firefighters of Los Angeles City Local 112 (UFLAC), has put a 0.5% sales tax increase on the November ballot.

The initiative is called Measure FD. This is not about a union looking for more cash to benefit its members.The fact is that the LA Fire Department (LAFD) has been woefully understaffed and underfunded for several years.  The biggest news, opinion and culture shaping California right now.

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Never miss a story Measure FD could raise almost $350 million each year — over a third of today’s firefighting budget — for equipment and services.It should not be necessary.But the mayor and the City Council have mismanaged LA’s money and emergency services so badly that firefighters are reduced to begging taxpayers for help.Now Angelenos could end up paying more taxes because their money wasn’t spent properly in the first place.In the year before the Palisades Fire on Jan.

7, 2025, LA spent more on homeless services than it did on firefighting. It’s one of the reasons that firefighters were not adequately deployed ahead of the fire: The LAFD brass allegedly didn’t want to pay overtime.The lack of funds also likely affected the LAFD’s decision to roll up their hoses and leave the scene of the Lachman Fire on Jan.2. That fire erupted on New Year’s Day, just after midnight, allegedly after being set by an arsonist.

The LAFD put it out within hours, but when firefighters came back the next day for “mop up” operations, they apparently left before the job was completely done, because of budget concerns.You know the rest: The high winds of Jan.7 reignited the Lachman Fire as the Palisades Fire.And o...