Los Angeles City Council committee continues review of citywide layoff plan; approves consent items

The Los Angeles City Council committee heard a personnel department briefing on citywide layoff management and voted to continue the matter for further work while approving six consent agenda items.

The personnel department told the committee that 614 filled positions included in the adopted budget will be eliminated when the new fiscal year begins July 1 and that staff are pursuing an expedited transfer process and other measures to reduce layoffs. Miss Phillips, a personnel department representative, said the city has issued roughly 16 conditional job offers so far and noted “almost 240 available positions” that the department is encouraging employees to apply for as transfers.

The update emphasized timing and technical limits: the personnel department and the Office of the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) will run Workday on July 1 to identify which eliminated positions remain filled and to determine how many substitute authorities will be required. Miss Phillips said layoff calculations are expected to begin in August and that the department may have to rely on manual calculations because the automated solution they had hoped to use is not available.

Why it matters: The adopted budget reductions affect dozens of departments and thousands of employees; the personnel department and the CAO are coordinating transfer options and substitute-authority arrangements intended to reduce the number of permanent separations.

Office of the CAO staff described outreach and procedures. Melissa Velasco of the CAO said a May 30 memo provided expedited procedures for issuing substitute authorities and encouraged departments to identify funded vacancies that could receive employees moved from eliminated positions. “As of July 1, we’ll do a new run in Workday to see how successful we’ve been,” Velasco said.

Departments described how the changes affect them. Brian Taft, commanding officer of the Personnel Division for the Los Angeles Police Department, said the LAPD accounts for 248 of the 614 impacted civilian positions (about 40% of the citywide total) and that the department is “committed to finding solutions” but faces limits given the volume of cuts. Yuri Zeich, personnel director for the Los Angeles Fire Department, said the fire department is not subject to layoffs and is already filling some vacancies by accepting transfers from impacted departments; Zeich said some employees in targeted classifications have declined offers because they are wary of moving during this period.

Ellen Linock of the Emergency Management Department said her department did not have positions eliminated and in fact added five positions when the climate emergency mobilization office moved to EMD; she noted one current vacancy that will be subject to the transfer portal process. Vince Cordillero of the personnel department summarized categories of exempt positions, noting some exemptions require mayoral and council approval under the charter and that exempt transfers must be reviewed case by case.

Committee members pressed for clarity on timelines, employee notice and the mechanics of transfers. Miss Phillips said the personnel department expects to notify employees at risk of layoff around August 1 when calculations begin and acknowledged that some formal notices in the past have been brief; she said staff will try to allow as much transition time as possible but that some notices may be short once calculations are complete.

The committee decided to continue the item and requested written reports and appearances from several departments at the next meeting to provide updated vacancy counts, transfer opportunities, and classification details. The clerk, controller, city attorney, general services and neighborhood empowerment departments were asked to appear.

Votes at a glance

- Item 1 — LA Fire and Police Veterans Association payroll-deduction authority (consent): approved on consent; public comment included a supportive statement from Captain Adam Dangrep of Los Angeles City Fire describing a voluntary $6-a-month payroll deduction to fund veteran outreach and services; full roll-call tally not specified in the record.

- Item 2 — Concur with Energy and Environment Committee recommendation (consent): approved on consent; details not specified in committee record.

- Item 3 — Adopt motion (consent): approved on consent; motion text not specified.

- Item 4 — Approve city attorney report (consent): approved on consent; report not specified.

- Item 5 — Concur with Transportation Committee and approve LA DOT recommendations (consent): approved on consent; docket details not specified.

- Item 7 — Approve Housing Department recommendation to exempt one project coordinator position (consent): approved on consent; specifics of the position not specified.

Next steps: The committee will keep the personnel department report on its agenda, and the requested departments will return with written updates on vacancies, transfers and classifications to inform the CAO’s and personnel department’s transfer and layoff calculations.