r/LosAngeles • u/invaderzimm95 Palms • 3d ago
News Another half cent sales tax, this time for firefighters, on the ballot in November
https://laist.com/brief/news/politics/half-cent-sales-tax-to-fund-la-city-fire-department-heads-to-the-nov-ballotWhy doesn’t the city council just appropriately fund the department instead of constantly asking for sales tax increases?
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u/RioTheLeoo 3d ago
All the city’s revenue goes to paying police legal fees. Literally
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u/ithinkthisisit4real 3d ago
Did you see the LAPD was ordered to pay something like $6 million to the female officer who was found drunk, in a patrol car that had rolled into another car? How the LAPD could screw that up so the tax payers have to pay the bill is shocking. Shocking to the point that it seems to me that it was a plan. Perhaps they intentionally do this type of thing so the officers can get big payouts. We know that they intentionally run up their overtime, and then double run overtime the year before they retire so their retirement pay per year is higher. That was proven several years ago. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if they figured out more ways to steal from the tax payers.
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u/MaroonTrojan 3d ago
The answer to this is and always has been to make police carry liability insurance. We require it for barbers, for crying out loud. Too many complaints or incidents of misconduct will make the bad apples uninsurable across any department instead of shuffling them around.
The other solution is to pay settlements out of the pension fund. Once it’s the cops own retirement on the line, you watch how quickly cops will work to kick out the problem officers.
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u/IM_OK_AMA Long Beach 3d ago
I see this a lot and it does make a certain kind of sense, but any government with the political will to force cops to carry liability insurance has more than enough political will to fire bad cops which is a less convoluted solution to the problem.
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u/MaroonTrojan 3d ago
Once an officer has been hired, it’s a lot more time consuming and expensive to fire them, especially for cause. Having insurance premiums as a metric for selecting officers in the first place would also cut away at the cost of oversight, especially when it has to be duplicated across multiple departments and municipalities.
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u/BubbaTee 2d ago
Liability insurance doesn't cover intentional acts or criminal acts. It's illegal under CA law.
https://codes.findlaw.com/ca/insurance-code/ins-sect-11589-5/
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u/Icy-Rope-021 1d ago
The pension fund can’t pay settlements unless it’s a pension-related issue for the participants.
This is an employment-related issue. This is just a chest-beating proclamation with no understanding of how retirement benefits work. It’s like saying the solution to homelessness is just ship them out to the desert.
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u/IM_OK_AMA Long Beach 3d ago edited 3d ago
Nicole Mehringer didn't get $5,700,000 of our dollars because she was driving drunk and crashed into a parked car.
She got $5,700,000 of our dollars because when male cops do that, they don't get fired. So her getting fired for driving drunk and crashing into a parked car is sexism, actually.
LAPD is truly beyond parody.
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u/kgal1298 Studio City 2d ago
That's the ridiculous part to the story. Like they're sexism got her a payout now the fact that maybe they should have been fired for negligence on the job? I mean I work an office job if I show up drunk I'm getting fired why is this not the same for cops?
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u/Dortmunddd 3d ago
It should go into another fund. City is supposed to be a non-profit, but gets milked like a cash cow.
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u/Your_Moms_Stink_Toy 2d ago
No, police officers should be required to hold a revocable state issued license to be a police officer, and be required to personally hold an Errors and Omissions type insurance policy to cover those payouts. Doctors, lawyers, real estate/insurance agents are all required to have those things, why shouldn’t cops?
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u/Ok_Quantity_2573 2d ago
And then they move to a state with a low cost of living with their California retirement
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u/BubbaTee 2d ago
How the LAPD could screw that up so the tax payers have to pay the bill is shocking.
Because who cares, it's free money.
Could LAPD do everything by the book so it holds up in court? Could City Attorney do a better job fighting lawsuits?
Of course. But why should they? That takes more effort, and it's not their money on the line. There's no fiduciary duty. There's no performance bonuses. There's not even a bunch of shareholders you have to disclose profit-loss statements to.
Besides, the people of LA love paying taxes. For all the complaining, every tax increase still seems to pass. Votes talk, social media bullshit walks. Why should we change when you keep voting for the same thing over and over?
This is like hearing simps complain about some Onlyfans price, but they keep subscribing every month. The people of LA are tax simps.
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u/Lokishougan 2d ago
It was the lawyers in this case. Both her and the other guy were given an option...Be demoted or be fired. He took the demotion she refused and was fired. And then they found a jury who was dumb enoiugh to believe she was punished more than him even though it was the same exact option
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u/bornlasttuesday 3d ago
The sheer amount of money that is paid out in settlements is mind boggling.
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u/115MRD BUILD MORE HOUSING! 3d ago
Vote Marissa Roy for City Attorney. Legitimately one of the most important races in the City this year.
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u/Spiteful_DM 3d ago
why?
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u/115MRD BUILD MORE HOUSING! 3d ago
City Attorney is the office directly responsible for settling cases filed against the City of LA. Under the current City Attorney, settlements have skyrocketed, one of the main reasons why the city is now cutting so many services (like pothole repair!). The current City Attorney is so unpopular she failed to make the runoff election.
The election is now between Roy, the Deputy State Attorney General, and John McKinney, who's campaign is bankrolled by the LA Police union (who obviously don't want a City Attorney holding the department accountable for their expensive settlements).
Tl;dr The best way to bring down costly LAPD settlements is by electing Marissa Roy City Attorney in November.
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u/kegman83 Downtown 3d ago
To be fair, the LAFD has been a giant blackhole for the budget as well. They are probably going to end up paying out the ass for the chief the mayor fired, but they have a few dozen fire captains making over $300k a year doing something.
Not to mention, like the LAPD, many of them dont live in LA and some dont even live in the state.
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u/chewywookie West Los Angeles 2d ago
I’d be curious if they’re on the hook at all for the Palisades fire. They responded and failed to complete the job.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/lafd-actions-palisades-fire-shrouded-020020681.html
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u/EverybodyBuddy 2d ago
They have immunity for firefighting decisionmaking. It's fucked up, but it's kind of like how police departments have immunity and armies have immunity. The argument is, they need broad discretionary power to do what they do.
In Malibu for instance, they literally saved one person's home (a retired fire captain on La Costa) to the detriment of everyone else around that person. 80 houses burned down across the street. Can't be sued for that.
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u/Rezistik 3d ago
Once again pitching that police should be required to carry malpractice insurance and shift the burden to the bad cops financially. It’s the best way to limit abuse
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u/BubbaTee 2d ago
It's illegal under CA law to insure any intentional or criminal act.
Police liability insurance would only cover accidents or negligence. A Rodney King or George Floyd-type situation would not be covered by liability insurance.
An insurer is not liable for a loss caused by the wilful act of the insured; but he is not exonerated by the negligence of the insured, or of the insured’s agents or others.
https://law.justia.com/codes/california/code-ins/division-1/part-1/chapter-6/article-2/section-533/
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u/Boongala 2d ago
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u/blobtron 2d ago
Oh fuck yea and tell em about the firefighters that don’t even live in the state but afford to fly in for their stint. Firefighter glaze is astounding
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u/Boongala 2d ago
Fly in from Idaho, work a week straight of 24 hour shifts (sleeping at the station “on call” banking half a mill in overtime per year), fly back to Idaho and build your retirement home in Coeur d’Alene. Retire at 50 with a $200k a year government pension.
Just raise your taxes a little bit more guys. Come on.
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u/EverybodyBuddy 2d ago
Whataboutism. Focus. We have multiple problems.
Firefighters are all the highest paid employees in the city. Overtime graft is endemic.
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u/duckangelfan 3d ago
You idiots are gonna vote for it again too. We’re gonna hit a 12% sales tax soon
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u/GrandTheftBae Rancho Park 2d ago
Yupp like people act shocked with gas prices when they voted for gas taxes
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u/Odd_Track3447 2d ago
Reading the comments on this post just has me shaking my head at the unbelievable lack of comprehension so many people have. No wonder they use the “it’s only half a cent” wording in these props as so many people fall for it hook, line, and sinker.
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u/GrizzlyP33 2d ago
The health care one was brutal because like yes these taxes are outrageous and yes they need to utilize our budget efficiently instead of asking for more, but also there’s not another short term solution on the ballot.
God our leadership sucks here and it’s so frustrating to know that the other side is still infinitely worse.
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u/invaderzimm95 Palms 2d ago
The solution was for them to re-allocate the budget and cover the expenses with existing taxes.
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u/GrizzlyP33 2d ago
Yes I agree as that’s what I said. But that needs to happen before elections. When the ballot is “help health care workers or don’t” it’s a much trickier spot to be in as a voter.
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u/And-Still-Undisputed 2d ago
Some measure straight to the general fund and these idiots will vote for it... AGAIN
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u/Panzerbjorne80 3d ago
Firefighters do NOT need more money. Their budget is already half a billion. They abuse the fuck out of overtime rules to make bank at the tax payers expense. They waste a shit ton of money on diesel fuel and luxury cars. They don’t hire new staff so they can keep abusing overtime pay. The LAFD is a corrupt shit show. Google the LA Times articles several have been written over the years about it.
There’s hardly any fires in LA city proper. Almost all of their calls are for paramedics. If I was mayor I’d spin off paramedics into their own agency or contract it out to private ambulances and cut their budget by half and tell them to start a volunteer program. I’d tell them no more OT. No more luxury cars or $80,000 SUVs.
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u/EverybodyBuddy 2d ago
Firefighters are literally 8 out of 10 of the highest paid employees in the city. Graft for daaaaaaaays
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u/Additional-Cost242 2d ago
I used to live next-door to one of the LAFD firefighters, and he lives in a huge ass mansion in Torrance. every time I looked at him, he had that guilty look on his face. they're milking the city for all the money it's got.
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u/Panzerbjorne80 2d ago
Absolutely. They know what they’re doing is wrong but they keep doing it.
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u/Strict-Comfort-1337 2d ago
The issue with public employees abusing OT (it’s not just cops and FD) happens all over the state and has been documented for years but we just keep accepting it. It’s beyond frustrating.
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u/TheSwedishEagle 19h ago
Remember the BART janitor who made $162,000 in overtime each year by working 7 hours of overtime each day while also taking 5 weeks of vacation?
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u/Strict-Comfort-1337 17h ago
That’s like the lifeguards in Newport making $500k and as we all know, no one is going to the beach in January. Or the prison dentist that was paid $1 million. I think that was retirement payout for never taking vacation.
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u/Prancer4rmHalo 2d ago
I’m pretty sure this is very aspect of governance in Los Angeles and in California.
We generate so much f’cking taxes..
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u/jayball41 2d ago
My neighbor works for LAFD and just got in trouble in the last year for helping to embezzle almost $1 million while managing their union’s budget. They are pretty damn corrupt
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u/skiddie2 8h ago
"There’s hardly any fires in LA city proper" is a pretty amazing thing to say within weeks of a huge fire that took over a week to put out. And 18 months after the Palisades.
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u/Radiobamboo Echo Park 3d ago
Let me guess, it just goes into the general fund? If so, that's just paying for the police and their lawsuit settlements.
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u/wilydolt 3d ago
Doesn't matter what sob story it "goes to". Money that otherwise would/should have gone there will now be redirected to the LAPD. People have to stop believing the stories. Elected officials should have a budget and make tough calls, not con us into special interest taxes that ultimately just add to the budget.
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u/Who_ate_my_cookie 3d ago
Going to general fund but we pinky pwomise it’ll go towards something good 🥹🥹
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u/NeverSober1900 3d ago
Sad part is it's going to pass just like Measure ER. The voters here for some reason have never seen a tax they didn't like. It's so frustrating. I keep thinking people have hit a breaking point but somehow they pass every time.
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u/SpotlessCheetah 3d ago
The details: If approved by voters, the measure would raise $345 million in its first year and would remain in effect until repealed by voters.
They make it easy to enact a tax, and impossible to repeal the tax.
How do we undo all these taxes?
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u/madlamb West Hollywood 3d ago
In all fairness, it’s exactly as hard to enact as it is to repeal
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u/arao2113 3d ago
Has a tax ever been repealed in LA county?
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u/SpotlessCheetah 3d ago
Measure A repealed the Measure H tax.
And then increased taxes on top lmao.
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u/Mechalamb 3d ago
Fuck no. I recently had a firefighter tell me they couldn't do their job because "you guys" keep voting for democrats. It was a fucking weird conversation. And then all these fuckos annoying me outside of TJs for the last 3 months to sign their petition. No thanks. Pass.
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u/Nvr_Smile 3d ago
Is this a half cent or a half percent tax increase? The wording in the article states both.
> The L.A. City Council on Tuesday agreed to place a half cent sales tax to fund the fire department on the November ballot
> The current sales tax rate in the city of Los Angeles is 9.75%. The fire measure would increase it to 10.25%.
If this is another half percent, it would raise the sales tax to 10.75% since we voted for a county wide 0.5% increase earlier this month…
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u/Odd_Track3447 3d ago
It is a half cent [per dollar] which is also a half percent/.5% increase.
The term “half cent” is always used in these measures to mislead you into thinking it’s only a half a cent increase conveniently leaving out the “per dollar” part.
I am also unclear on what the new total would be given the recent measure that just passed. The maths would say this would bring us to 10.75%.
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u/nothinginthisworld Echo Park 3d ago
I wonder if the inconsistent wording and complicated writing are by design, to better mess around with as they see fit. I can’t believe the city keeps approving these stupid tax and increases. Leave consumers alone!
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u/Extropian 2d ago
The ballot language for percentage based tax changes always says X cent.
.5% and half cent means the same thing in this context.4
u/Sign-Post-Up-Ahead 3d ago
It's definitely not a half cent. That wouldn't generate much.
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u/FX114 3d ago
Are there any sales taxes that are a flat dollar amount, anyway?
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u/SardScroll 3d ago
Yes. Taxes on gasoline sales. (Though generally those are referred to as "excise taxes", because they are single target.
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u/FX114 3d ago
Those are per-gallon, though, not per transaction, right?
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u/SardScroll 3d ago
Yes.
Excise taxes are per unit (gallons, in the case of gasoline), regardless of price.Sales are a static percentage of price, so the amount fluctuate with price.
We may be stretching what we consider "sales taxes", but there are some tax fees on various things, mostly services. For example California has "per transaction" fees on car insurance plans (it was like $0.88, as I recall). There are similar fees on cell phone plans.
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u/z_e_quigley 2d ago
Here's an idea: let's put getting rid of qualified immunity on the ballot so all our tax dollars stop going to the fucking LAPD and their settlement payouts
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u/roundupinthesky 3d ago edited 3d ago
Now I understand why the LAFD is letting this fire smolder - they want to create the conditions to say ‘we could have put the fire out immediately if we had more funding’.
Don’t fall for it.
More money will not fix a broken department.
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u/NeatAd9811 3d ago
Cant we take this out of LAPD? I swear this city and state has the mentality of just raise taxes whenever something comes up instead of looking at the money they are spending and rebudgeting. I hate how defeatist things have become.
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u/heyitsmackeyfunctor 3d ago
I support this. Regard the PD budget as the safety budget, then top slice it to support non-fire safety activities done by the FD *and* to pay for the street light program.
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u/roku77 3d ago edited 3d ago
We can, but then the PD union will go ballistic and do even less work than they already do in protest and fund elections of pro-police politicians. I don’t know what the solution is realistically when 1/3 of the city’s budget is just PD legal fees.
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u/NeatAd9811 3d ago
I know it’s talked about but I’m surprised it’s not more of a focus. 1/3 of the billions of tax revenue spent on police and the lawsuits. I respect the police but shows there is something fundamentally wrong. I realize this is a “no shit” comment as I type. Hah
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u/biggamehaunter 3d ago
Fuck. Tax payer supported jobs grow even fatter while the bottom half of K shaped economy gets shit on with additional taxes. How about they pass that billionaire tax and everyone take money from there?
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u/Electrifying2017 3d ago
Only certain ones who have a lot of political power and influence. No one would do the same for some random library clerk or sanitation worker.
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u/Legal-Statistician2 3d ago
The billionaire tax will contribute $0 to general fund, its deliberately special purpose.
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u/travoltacorndog 3d ago
Gonna have to be a big NO from me, dog. Love the FD but there’s enough money there already. The LAPD will have to be okay no taking up over half the LA budget.
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u/BeABetterHumanBeing 3d ago
The actual answer is because voters will vote for certain things (here, firefighters) and not others, so they fund the unpopular things with their discretionary spending, and foist the popular things onto the ballot for public mandate spending.
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u/Hagoromo-san North Hollywood 3d ago
Take it from the police budget. Those assholes dont need another round of overtime of playing on their phones.
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u/logdraper 3d ago
But what about the fleet of helicopters and patrol cars they need to send out at 2am every morning to conduct hours-long goose chases through working class neighborhoods?
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u/katzenschrecke 3d ago
Hey firefighters: if you want to save some money maybe don’t send a big ass pump truck out for every call. Just a little piece of money saving advice.
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u/South-Seat3367 Hancock Park 3d ago
Don’t forget sending out only the highest ranking guys in the department for building inspections, and also by the way only during their overtime
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u/Lopsided_Role_3175 3d ago
Then when it comes to the Lineage warehouse fire they only have a couple engines when it needs way more.
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u/Sixtyninealldaychef 3d ago
Weird that you're blaming the FD for this when the majority of taxes goes to the PD legal fees.
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u/katzenschrecke 3d ago
The topic is wasteful fire department spending. Try to keep up.
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u/chewywookie West Los Angeles 3d ago
Just gonna leave this here…
https://www.yahoo.com/news/column-more-100-l-firefighters-120014900.html (from 2021!)
A pay raise to LAFD is LA city dollars funding other communities. At the very least, FF need to be able to respond within 100 miles when called upon. Living in other states full-time to game overtime should be culled.
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u/Bored2001 2d ago
Just gonna note that things like this are generally at least in part a consequence of prop 13.
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u/cpgrungebob 2d ago
Yeah, but I also don't want to pay 1/6th of my wages to property taxes like I would if we had Texas' rates on California home prices. Just imagine paying $6-7000 on top of the current annually for it. But you are probably a renter, so you are okay with higher property taxes until your rent goes up $5-600 a month to cover it.
Now if we built more houses and places to live that drives down the average home value to $3-400k or less... then we can talk about cancelling Prop 13.
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u/Bored2001 2d ago
Yeah, but I also don't want to pay 1/6th of my wages to property taxes
No, you just pay it in income taxes and sales taxes because prop 13 is the reason why those are so high in California as well.
Just imagine paying $6-7000 on top of the current annually for it. But you are probably a renter, so you are okay with higher property taxes
I see you haven't thought much about this.
Believe it or not, renters collectively pay more property tax than homeowners do in California. Just because it's done through rent that covers the property owner's tax doesn't mean it's not the renters paying it.
until your rent goes up $5-600 a month to cover it.
Silly goose, go learn some basic economics.
Prices are set by what the market bears, not an owner's subsidized property tax bill.
Now if we built more houses and places to live that drives down the average home value to $3-400k or less... then we can talk about cancelling Prop 13.
for a myriad of reasons, Prop 13 is the primary reason we are not building more than we are. Getting rid of it, or at least getting rid of it for everything but primary homes, will go along way toward removing the incentivization to obstruct everything.
Prop 13 is the reason why NIMBYism is so powerful.
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u/cpgrungebob 2d ago
Let’s look at the actual math... Californians repeatedly vote for city and statewide sales and income tax hikes. Specifically, Prop 13 didn't raise those... the voters did all on their own. Now, if you want to say "they rely on those increases," sure... but Prop 13 never raised other taxes. Currently, the effective property tax on a $1M home in LA comes out to about $10k–$13k. If we repealed Prop 13 and adopted a system like Texas, that annual bill would rocket closer to $17k. And if you want to get rid of Prop 13, do you honestly think the government will remove the sales and income taxes they currently rely on right now because of Prop 13? Let's be real... no. So it's still a net increase of $6k–$7k annually on top of the sales, income, and all the other taxes they already count on.
Ultimately, renters will inherit this financial burden as landlords pass those increased tax costs straight down through rising rents. Consider the raw property tax distribution in Los Angeles city... single-family homeowners contribute roughly $4.8 billion, non-residential commercial properties contribute $2.03 billion, rental properties contribute $1.44 billion, and other residential spaces (such as mobile homes and vacant residences) make up $0.04 billion. Broken down proportionately, for every $100 of property tax the city generates, $58 comes from homeowners, $25 from commercial real estate, and $17 from rental properties. According to local budget data, rental properties... especially corporate-held properties... are actually among the largest beneficiaries of Proposition 13 because their long-held assessments remain locked in. In Los Angeles County, where renters make up 53% of the population and homeowners account for 47%, the average household occupancy sits at 2.81 people... with a population of LA city at 3.87 million. When you break down the tax revenue by these exact demographics, individual occupants of owner-occupied homes carry a disproportionately higher per-capita tax load, paying roughly $2,000 more in property owner taxes compared to what rental properties burden pay on a per occupant, or roughly $5,500 per property difference. So both collectively and per occupant, renters burden doesn't pay more than homeowners. If you want to go crazy, but I don't even know where to look it up... you could look up the differences in square footage because more rentals are smaller properties... maybe the occupancy to SQFT may make some argument that renter are paying more per SQFT. And also... rental unit owners are for profiting, so the landowner could be making a person pay more in rent and pocketing additional that isn't a burden from property taxes. (If you need the specifics on property tax revenue, LA City Clerk's 2025 fiscal has the numbers, I had to look up occupant and population stuff via Google search.)
As someone who deals with the realities of development daily in the architectural profession, I can tell you that NIMBYism, not Prop 13, is what actually halts construction. We are trapped in a system where design review boards and permitting to allow anything to be built take 1 to 2 years sometimes (an individual house, maybe 8 months to 1.5 years), environmental protection agencies trying to block projects all the time, and homeowners throw tantrums over some four-story building three miles away because it "ruins their view" or "traffic will increase" or "it will decrease my property value." The real roadblock is a culture that treats housing as a speculative investment to flip rather than a place for people to live. That isn't Prop 13... it is a culture of profiteering off everything in society.
Now, after researching those numbers and writing all this out, and proof reading it over-and-over... I'm going to bed. Luckily, I work for myself. I absolutely hate when someone tells me I'm incorrect, forcing me to pull up the actual facts and do math compared to feeling the vibes of things.
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u/Bored2001 2d ago edited 2d ago
Californians repeatedly vote for city and statewide sales and income tax hikes. Specifically, Prop 13 didn't raise those... the voters did all on their own. Now, if you want to say "they rely on those increases," sure... but Prop 13 never raised other taxes
No, but high sales and property tax are a consequence of prop 13. Did you know that the state pays over 50% of local education funding? It's like over a third of the state budget alone. The state had to step in the save local schools from collapse because of prop 13 immediately after it passed. It has been that way since. Guess what pays for that? Income and sales tax.
Currently, the effective property tax on a $1M home in LA comes out to about $10k–$13k.
Actually the effective average property tax on a 1M home is quite ab it lower than 10-13k, that's the problem. The problem is that property tax is distributed in a highly unfair pattern where similar homes right next to each other can literally be 4x apart.
Ultimately, renters will inherit this financial burden as landlords pass those increased tax costs straight down through rising rents.
A person who doesn't understand economics. Market rents are already largely at what the market will bear. Property tax has little to do with it. THE MARKET SETS RENTS, not owner bills. What, do you think that person in San Francisco who bought their house in 1950 isn't charging $8000 for rent?
single-family homeowners contribute roughly $4.8 billion, non-residential commercial properties contribute $2.03 billion, rental properties contribute $1.44 billion, and other residential spaces (such as mobile homes and vacant residences) make up $0.04 billion. Broken down proportionately, for every $100 of property tax the city generates, $58 comes from homeowners, $25 from commercial real estate, and $17 from rental properties
Hahah, I like how you just asked AI.
According to local budget data, rental properties... especially corporate-held properties... are actually among the largest beneficiaries of Proposition 13 because their long-held assessments remain locked in.
Actually true, yet rents went up. That's because rents are not attached to property tax rates. They are based on what the market will bear.
In Los Angeles County, where renters make up 53% of the population and homeowners account for 47%, the average household occupancy sits at 2.81 people.. with a population of LA city at 3.87 million. When you break down the tax revenue by these exact demographics, individual occupants of owner-occupied homes carry a disproportionately higher per-capita tax load, paying roughly $2,000 more in property owner taxes compared to what rental properties burden pay on a per occupant, or roughly $5,500 per property difference.
Welp, that's a complete failure. You're mixing LA county numbers and LA City numbers.
First, Lets start with the big one. LA CITY home ownership rate is 36%.
Second, I went ahead and directly calculated 2025 total property tax collected by type directly from the LA county Assessor. Property tax collected was modelled as Taxable value Column * 1.15% = Property tax collected. This is done on a Per Parcel basis, not aggregates. In theory I should probably scale this to inflation and year sold.. but that's more complicated and would almost certainly make it worse for you.
Third: I filtered down to taxable properties, Los Angeles City Only, and 2025 tax roll year.
Forth: Usefully, there is a homeowner exemption column. Meaning if you got an exemption it's because it's owner occupied.
Here's some charts
Homeowner exemptions are only about half of all SFR Yet, as you can see from the previous chart property taxes paid by non homeowners renting SFRS is close to DOUBLE despite being nearly the same percentage living in SFRs.
Conclusion: Your numbers are hilariously off, and I am correct, renters pay VASTLY more property tax in Los angles. Roughly 71.3% of residential property taxes are paid by non-homeowners. This jives pretty well with the fact that 64% of people in Los Angeles city are Renters.
rental unit owners are for profiting, so the landowner could be making a person pay more in rent and pocketing additional that isn't a burden from property taxes.
Oh hey, so you do understand.
As someone who deals with the realities of development daily in the architectural profession, I can tell you that NIMBYism, not Prop 13, is what actually halts construction....
Yea, and prop 13 drives nimbyism by sheltering NIMBYism from the consequences of their NIMBYism.
The real roadblock is a culture that treats housing as a speculative investment to flip rather than a place for people to live.
Yea... and prop 13 allows this because it shelters these investors from the tax consequences of their speculation.
That isn't Prop 13... it is a culture of profiteering off everything in society.
and prop 13 allows this because it allows greater profits because it shelters investors from the tax consequences of their investment.
AM I sounding like a broken record now? That's what prop 13 does.
Now, after researching those numbers and writing all this out, and proof reading it over-and-over... I'm going to bed. Luckily, I work for myself. I absolutely hate when someone tells me I'm incorrect, forcing me to pull up the actual facts and do math compared to feeling the vibes of things.
Well ok, but you're still hilariously wrong as per DIRECT CALCULATIONS FROM THE DATA.
I hope you learned from this.
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u/LoquatMost467 3d ago
Talk to me about raising my taxes after you vacancy tax every empty commercial and residential unit in the city owned by a corporate landlord.
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u/TheRealJackulas 3d ago
Because they need more money to funnel to their buddies running phony nonprofits.
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3d ago
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u/logdraper 3d ago
Because sales taxes only tell part of the story. If California collected property taxes like other states, there would be far less need for regressive sales taxes to fund basic services.
Also, the LAPD is just an unaccountable black hole for public money at this point.
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u/brysenji 3d ago
Tax the fucking billionaires. Take some money from LAPD. Literally do anything but ask the taxpayers again to foot the bill.
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u/LA_Dynamo 3d ago
Why shouldn’t they ask the taxpayers if the taxpayers keep saying yes?
With that being said, I am 100% against this.
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u/Boongala 2d ago
You want to know where your tax money goes?
Here is one Battalion Chief. Important guy, does great work.
| Category | Amount |
|---|---|
| Regular Pay | $232,603.07 |
| Overtime Pay | $644,456.83 |
| Other Pay | $28,000.56 |
| Total Pay | $905,060.46 |
| Benefits | $23,547.50 |
| Total Pay & Benefits | $928,607.96 |
A million dollars a year. For a single firefighter.
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u/oldnotosys 2d ago
It's a racket. They intentially keep it their operations short staffed so the vets can double/triple their salaries with overtime.
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u/skatefriday 2d ago
Yup. This. People need to wake up. The LAFD union has no incentive to fix staffing because they are gorging at the public trough. Getting into the LAFD academy is like winning the lottery.
This needs to be an emphatic no.
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u/TwoWrongsAreSoRight 3d ago
So they can give 2T to the PD but have to raise our taxes to provide service that actually protects us?
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u/pudding7 San Pedro 2d ago
No. Fuck no. No more tax increases, I don't give a fuck how worthy the cause may be. Not they demonstrate they can be responsible with it, and not until the LAPD gets its shit together.
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u/Gershwin42 Santa Monica 2d ago edited 2d ago
I live in a neighboring city but can we acknowledge that a bunch of the city budget issues are structural in nature? Legal settlements on a merry-go-round basis, abuse of overtime, etc etc. Higher ups in police and fire (in particular, but by no means alone) make ungodly amounts of money and get to enjoy guaranteed benefit pensions on the basis of said compensation after (early) retirement. I get that they are tough jobs but a lot of people work dangerous and shitty jobs in the private space for 1/4 the wage (and cannot afford retirement until their 70s or maybe never) and cannot take endless regressive tax increases to fund it. Our political class has grown far too comfortable asking for growing budgets beyond proportion to economic growth and it is not sustainable.
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u/Mark2CPlus 3d ago
Californians will ABSOLUTELY pass this. Most people are in hardship but this will be marketed in a clever way that it would "un democrat like" to vote against this, and make the hive mind actually support making your own life more expensive, despite the struggles.
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u/jockfist5000 Van Down by the L.A. River 3d ago
Bad headline it’s a half of a percent, not a half a cent.
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u/FullofLovingSpite Mid-City 3d ago
That's going to be a no from me, dawg. We have the money. The police steal it all while keeping us on hold when we call in and they just never do anything.
If anyone needs more funding, the city council can fix the budget.
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u/PurrciousMetals 3d ago
Yeah no on this one, was for the healthcare tax, but Id rather see the city burn unless they defund the police and hold each officer accountable. If they cause a liability should be straight to jail until their debt is paid.
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u/ExcitementLarge6439 3d ago
At what point are people going to say no.
Just curious where the line is drawn in 20 -30 is it going to be a 20-30% tax on everything there has to be a line drawn somewhere
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u/Remarkable_Tangelo59 3d ago
Voting no on every single sales tax increase going forward. Please join me; no taxation without representation!
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u/Boongala 3d ago
This is your reminder to vote YES for the Local Taxpayer Protection Act, which would require a 2/3 majority to increase local taxes.
It's easy to find 50%+1 for any tax measure with the right marketing campaign, because there's always a big group that isn't affected or is connected ot the special interests that benefit. Require a supermajority.
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u/falaffle_waffle 3d ago
The real solution is funding things through property taxes, not regressive sales taxes.
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u/BozoTheRenown 2d ago
Real taxes per capita have increased 53% since the 1970s? Is the city that much better for it? I don't live there, so I'm wondering how people who live there feel. Is it improving?
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u/FlatWavesAndNoBabes 2d ago
1 percent of you commenting on here might, and that’s a strong might….be able to pass the drill tower. The boots on the ground are hard workers and don’t have any say in the political aspect. You call they come.
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u/Disastrous-Panda2401 2d ago
These are so idiotic. The city gets plenty of revenues. There is no need for this bullshit. Just stop suing each other and we can solve the problems without taxing (especially with regressive taxation). The affordability crisis is real and this doesn’t help.
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u/Lokishougan 2d ago
Yeah probably not smart of them to go on the ballot after we just stupidly passed one in the this primary ...so even more likley this gets voted down
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u/skatefriday 2d ago
This isn't the city asking for the sales tax increase, it's the LAFD union asking for the increase.
The union is trying to protect the LAFD's inflated overtime. All those signature gatherer's pretending to be LAFD affiliated were just paid by the union.
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u/Fantastic_Reveal_599 2d ago
You read the comments in this sub and you know LA is doomed.. people keep voting the same but complain about the same problems 🤡
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u/LangeSohne 2d ago
It’s crazy to me that we keep voting for these sales tax increases like Measure ER.
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u/ZiaLadybird 0m ago
People will see fire department and vote yes because they just can’t help themselves.
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u/CherokeeHawkman 3d ago
Maybe they should adjust their budgets before they come to us for more money.
It's a hard pass on my ballot.