Los Angeles is overpaying its city employees, according to a report released by a government watchdog group.
OpentheBooks found that Mayor Eric Garcetti earned $269,375, which is $67,000 more than Gov. Gavin Newsom. Also, some 20,000 city employees earned more than $147,000 while taxpayers footed the bill to the tune of $3 billion, according to a Forbes report.
“You can't take care of the homeless if you're funding a large group of special interests, including government employees, making extreme profits from the crisis,” Open the Books CEO and Founder Adam Andrzejewski said.
The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority found that 66,436 people are homeless in Los Angeles County, which is a 12.7% increase from 2019, and 41,290 are experiencing homelessness in the City of Los Angeles.
"What's the compelling public purpose for working and middle-class taxpayers across the country to bail out LA,” Andrzejewski told the Southern California Record. “The city needs to solve their own problems."
While Gov. Gavin Newsom earns $202,000 yearly, tree trimmers in LA, also known as tree surgeons, earned $5,000 more at $207,058.
"There's a new $75 an hour minimum wage for 20,000 highly compensated public employees in the city,” Andrzejewski said in an interview. “Our figures at OpenTheBooks.com show that the first 20,000 city workers average annual pay is nearly $150,000 per year."
San Francisco faces a similar dilemma with 18,759 employees earning a minimum of $150,000 yearly despite the city’s $1.5 billion budget deficit, according to the Forbes report.
“The city is in trouble,” Andrzejewski said about San Francisco. “Whenever we open the books, San Francisco consistently ranks among the worst tax-and-spend offenders.”
Interns are among a class of workers in LA Mayor Garcetti’s office that aren’t faring as well as the top tree trimmers in the Street Services division who earn $45,206 to $86,306 in overtime pay, according to the report.
“Although intern positions are available in dozens of departments working on issues such as homelessness, sustainability, and immigration, those internships are not compensated,” Andrzejewski said.
Some 261 staffers earned more than $20 million working for Mayor Garcetti, according to OpentheBooks data.
"Taxpayer dollars must follow people in need and not over-compensate government administrators," Andrzejewski said.