In desperate bid for reelection, Mayor Karen Bass reveals $15B proposed budget for Los Angeles

Karen Bass has revealed plans to splurge another near $15 billion in her budget as she desperately clings to power.

The Los Angeles Mayor dropped a raft of sweeping changes Monday morning but wants to keep dozens of city services the same.

It comes as Bass desperately seeks reelection later this year as she is hunted down by candidates such as Spencer Pratt, who has surged in the polls.

A significant portion of the city’s budget is powered by business taxes, one of the largest contributors to the general fund that pays for core services like police, fire response and street repairs.

Just last week, the City Council moved to study a ballot measure that would repeal that tax entirely, a proposal that could rip an estimated $800 million a year out of the city’s finances.

When The Post asked Bass about the business tax portion of the budget, she did not hedge. “Eliminating the business tax would eliminate the Fire Department,” she said.

Front and center of this year’s budget is the promise meant to dominate headlines: 510 new LAPD hires.

But inside the numbers, it is less expansion than survival. City officials expect most of those hires to replace officers who are leaving.

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Even if the plan goes through, staffing is projected to fall to about 8,555 officers by 2027, down sharply from roughly 10,000 just a few years ago.

“For the nation’s second largest city, our force is relatively small. This year it is about preventing the shrinkage,” Bass said when pressed on whether council members aligned with defund the police activism would support the plan.

The same political bloc that has pushed to limit policing is now being asked to sign off on a hiring plan framed as essential just to keep the department from shrinking further.

The California Post has repeatedly shown how that divide has shaped policy decisions, slowed hiring efforts and created uncertainty around long term staffing.

The Los Angeles Police Protective League is backing the mayor’s proposal, warning that the department is already stretched thin.

“The mayor’s balanced budget protects public safety and funds the hiring of 510 police officers to keep Angelenos safe and maintain the LAPD’s ability to respond to 911 calls,” the union said, urging the City Council to ensure enough staffing to provide backup and maintain coverage across the city.

Bass acknowledged the strain, describing it as “basically cuts,” with no expansion planned until at least November as the city considers asking voters for more funding.

Across the rest of the budget, the pattern holds. Massive spending with minimal change.

The plan leans on about $8.3 billion in general fund revenue driven by higher business, property and sales taxes, allowing the city to avoid layoffs after last year’s near $1 billion deficit scare.

The revenue surge keeps the system afloat, even as broader economic warning signs begin to surface. Homelessness remains one of the largest and most controversial pieces.

Bass is allocating $104 million to her marquee homeless program Inside Safe and roughly $778 million overall to homelessness programs, preserving a system that has already cost billions.

The administration points to a reported 17.5 percent drop in unsheltered homelessness, but the price tag and long term outcomes continue to draw scrutiny as the city relies heavily on costly hotel and motel placements.

Other spending priorities fill in the edges. About $36 million for sidewalk repairs tied to legal settlements. Expanded curb cuts at intersections. Increased street cleaning.

And $1 million for RepresentLA, a legal defense program for immigrants that has drawn political backlash.

Now the proposal heads to the City Council, where weeks of hearings will determine whether this hold the line strategy survives or gets reshaped again.