The Personnel and Hiring Committee of the Los Angeles City Council held a special meeting to address mounting payroll problems at the Los Angeles Fire Department after multiple members and union leaders said sworn firefighters continue to receive incorrect paychecks following the city’s Workday payroll transition.

The meeting, convened by Committee Chair Councilmember Kevin McOsker, centered on a set of seven issue categories the union provided and on the immediate, short-term and long-term resources needed to correct pay errors. "All we want is for this to be fixed," said Chung Ho, a director with United Firefighters of Los Angeles City, summarizing union testimony.

Why it matters: Firefighters said payroll mistakes have left some members without promised overtime, retroactive contractual increases and even with large inappropriate deductions. Union speakers described missing sick and vacation accruals, an incorrect $1,000 deduction applied to many members, and individual cases with six-figure payment gaps. "If you add this conservative number up of just 3,000 members ... that's a $3,000,000 kept from our members," said Ryan Quigley, a union director and 22-year veteran.

What officials said: The city’s Workday project team, represented by Eduardo Magos of the Information Technology Agency and vendor representatives from Accenture/Workday, said the broader Workday deployment has paid more than 49,000 employees over 16 payrolls with accuracy they estimate at 99.9% across the city, but acknowledged a backlog and department-specific integration challenges affecting fire.

John Ruprecht of Accenture said LAFD sworn staff time is not entered directly in Workday; instead the department’s NSS scheduling system feeds time records into Workday. "The firefighters are not actually on Workday time tracking," Ruprecht said, and that difference drives extra manual work and more complex corrections for the department.

The elected City Controller (name not stated at the hearing) told the committee the city must add both personnel and technical capacity to deliver a sustainable fix. The controller said the office mapped out an initial request that included 19 additional positions and approximately $1.5 million for a targeted technological solution to address fire-specific payroll needs, and described both short-term remedy work and a longer-term staffing and systems plan.

Fire Department officials said the shift from the prior PACER system to Workday introduced more manual business-process steps for complex payroll items and that the department has been under-resourced for the number of special payroll transactions it requires. Chief Deputy Administrative Operations Oren Saunders said the combination of the Workday change, prior staffing reductions and the department’s unique pay practices have "crippled" the LAFD’s ability to ensure accurate pay without additional support.

Union testimony and examples: Multiple union leaders described the real-world consequences for firefighters and their families. Kevin Frank, a newly elected union director and nearly 20-year veteran, said members are working 24-hour shifts for many consecutive days during the fires and return home to find paychecks that do not reflect the work. Doug Coats, first vice president of the union, said missing vacation and sick balances have immediate impacts for members who must take time for serious family illnesses.

City response and next steps: Committee Chair McOsker directed creation of a cross-agency Tiger team that will include the Fire Department, ITA, Personnel, Controller’s Office, the City Administrative Officer and Workday/Accenture representatives. The committee asked the team to identify immediate fixes, to propose temporary reassignments of city staff to assist the LAFD, to document staffing and technological needs for a sustainable solution, and to return with a status report within seven days at a special committee meeting.

The Controller’s office and ITA said Workday has embedded additional vendor resources into the fire operations and that the vendor will provide more consultants without additional cost to the city to accelerate fixes during the emergency. The Personnel Department told the committee it had identified 22 staff from Personnel and five from the City Clerk’s office who could assist with Workday transactions as available.

Ending: The committee scheduled a special follow-up session in seven days to review ticket closures, the effectiveness of temporary reassignment and any proposed budget or staffing changes to prevent further payroll disruptions.