INGLEWOOD – The Inglewood city council will hear grim news during the May 24 regular city council meeting. Budget Manager Keauonna Buchannon and Assistant City Manager Mark Weinberg will detail the adopted budget has been amended to included an additional $16 million in expenditures carried over from the prior year raising the deficit from $9.8 million to $22.8 million.

Near the close of FY 2021-2022, the City entered into multiple law enforcement agreement with outside agencies for services during special events. The City earmarked $9 million for CHP, $5 million for the LA County Sheriff’s department, and $2 milion for Hawthorne PD.
“That was the beginning year projection. Actually if you read page 2, the current projection is a $1.9 million deficit which includes the carry over funding of $16.3 million in capital expenses from prior fiscal year. These are projections of both revenues and expenditures. The actuals are what counts. If all the capital projects are not completed, we will end up with a surplus. You should read the entire document,” said Butts.
According to the budget, the police account for $100 million of the City’s budget.

The additional law enforcement contracts come at a crucial time as Inglewood Police Department staffing levels have fell to a critical status with more departures planned in the coming weeks.
“Eventually the City will be reimbursed by Hollywood Park.”
James T. Butts
Buchannon continues to include a footnote that law enforcement services are a reimbursable expense, but based on these numbers, the City is either not being reimbursed, or the money is mysteriously sitting in another account that they will find in a couple of years.
Related: Inglewood Finance Department provides questionable explanation for bond overpayment
Inglewood Police Officers Association have already stepped out on a limb and endorsed Councilman Alex Padilla for re-election, however, all bargaining units are being told “Hero Pay” is on hold, and any expectations of raises are unrealistic.
The City’s warrant register details invoices from mid 2020 were just paid last week, and many checks are going out of 1 W. Manchester Blvd. that aren’t designated for any particular department.
The average warrant register typically includes close to $4 million in payments, however, this week’s total is less than $2 million with invoices dating back to mid 2021.
The City will continue to deny access to City Hall under AB 361, keeping residents out of the building without an appointment or accessing council chambers for meetings. The City does allow monthly parking and traffic commissio meeting to be in person in Community Room A.
The City continues to hide behind COVID despite the council sitting shoulder to shoulder, without masks, during all meetings.
The hypocrisy is while the residents are denied access, the City is busy planning parties to double as campaign events for them to schmooze with residents, still irate about the disastrous permit parking program and home registration fees. These events are typically sponsored by the City where taxpayers pay for law enforcement.
The City claims to have an “audited” $75 million in the reserves, but can we trust that? The City hasn’t done anything publicly with the $15.5 million received from Biden last July, nor does this include the additional $15.5 million that’s coming.
They have most likely injected it into the reserves, to appear more solvent than we are and then turn around and use it on police services for SoFi, the Forum, and YouTube.
Let’s be honest with ourselves. If we are $22 million in the hole now, and this is after the Super Bowl receipts have been tallied, when exactly will the city see any of this additional $20 million a year the mayor so proudly championed as a plus for the return of the NFL?
The mayor came in with the finances out of control, and we right back where we started.
Mayor James T. Butts needs to resign. Effective immediately.
Oh. And that’s not Sharon Koike’s signature on the staff report.
4 Comments
This staff report seems to assume anyone reading it Doesn’t notice the comparisons are for the lock down year when city hall was closed most employees across the county stayed at home because of essential service only orders.
Everyone should take a look see at this report….yes even those who are not accounting types! And please remember they chose to compare the current year with the pretty much closed for COVID year!
Notice especially what is not there..
Can anyone find where all the legal fees for the Zipper Fiasco are hidden ?
How about the legal fees for the crash for red-light running while in a car that should not need to be borrowed by a man making $350,000.00 a year in tax dollars.
How are we supposed to accept that in this very real to most of us (stay at home to avoid Covid exposure year ) the staff report suggests we have higher staff expenses?
Most Cities facilities other than when preparing parties for Kroenke guests were closed to residents ie community centers just beginning to open in selected neighborhoods only – yeah some of our kids somehow don’t qualify for equal opportunity .
Per contract weren’t our Park maintenance staff supposed to be caring for the “public areas” of Kroenkeville?
Hmmmm…Then why are their hours not considered reimbursable as the security/ police expenses?
Maybe that Auto Mall once proposed using private money would have been a good idea, after all considering the increase of auto sale tax dollars went up even when most found themselves stuck at home working by zoom……good figure
So much, so wrong if you just read any one page- take your pick – Sentences will jump off the page dance in your face and scream what §€#& !!!!
No wonder the City Council led by the Mayor were so busy Badmouthing Barbara Ohno and Wanda Brown ——that fellow residents is called discounting and distraction like when the kid caught doing wrong starts screaming “you all are picking on me me all this stuff in my pockets was put in my pockets by everyone else not sweet innocent me…..”
At some point voters need to wake up and say no more, not one more day!!!
As for those police reimbursements and the impact on our future pension obligations, ..could that be one reason rather than paying off that pension bond JTB and his Cohorts chose to extend the terms so we pay on our property tax bills every year for the next few decades?
Are Favored Police Union members making so much in “event day overtime dollars” they will have serious increases to their lifetime retirement benefits…..See Transparent California and remember the 2021 totals will look like peanuts compared to the Super Bowl lead up weekend overtime!!!!
What are the chances those perks influenced their campaign endorsements ?
Just for fun total out how much Jimmy’s “LOVE interest” has been paid and imagine how many youth senior programs that money could have been spent on.
Hopefully the City provides a full detail of the CIP projects, cost and completion dates for all to see, if in fact once they’re done we will only be $1.9million in the hole.
What we also don’t see is the additional $8 million in revenue that reduces the initial $9.8 million deficit to only $1.9M. The initial FY 2021-2022 budget didn’t discuss carryovers until now.
Each council member and the Mayor have voted for each dollar spent. They can not blame anyone except the faces in their mirror.
Each should be held accountable for their reckless spending and disregard for public dollars!
Not completing a capitol improvement is not saving money it is putting off repairs and maintenance which may cause double or triple spending for damages those delays cause.
Consider all this excessive spending has taken place when the CITY FACILITIES HAVE BEEN CLOSED TO THE PUBLIC supposedly to keep COVID in check but hey why are we throwing parties and inviting non-residents to gather without masks on our streets and our dime, putting our community at health risk if truly there is any COVID concern.
L A County COVID statistics reflect Inglewood’s death rate is higher than surrounding communities but the city council choose to party on spending $20,000.00 to $30,000.00 each event. How many lives were impacted by exposure to those who attended those parties ?
This group of elected’s has chosen to frivolously spend our money, hundreds of thousands to pay for one man’s lack of control of his zipper, and their willingness to provide salary and pensions for unqualified and unnecessary friends from his past rather than hiring qualified individuals based on legitimate workplace skill sets for public rather than personal benefit.
We deserve much better than this group of five! In November let’s give 3 of them a good-bye send-off and pray their next stop requires an orange jumpsuit wardrobe.
Business 101 : a business that routinely spends more than it takes in are not usually around long
If we had our Police Department at full strength and we had speedy response when residents called along with having 4 functioning community oriented police centers then maybe we could feel comfortable with the large percentage of our money going to police but we DO NOT HAVE a full complement of officers, which means we are paying for officers who work for other agencies or cities !
But when the Mayor who receives a a pension of $ 250,000.00 from Santa Monica along with the $100,000.00 salary from Inglewood residents and still can’t figure out how to budget that $350,000.00 well enough to buy his own car …..what can we expect?
The quote “EVENTUALLY THE CITY WILL BE REIMBURSED” ……sounds an awful lot like giving a “FORGIVEN LOAN” doesn’t it?
Or did he intentionally refer to a non-existent entity in naming who won’t be reimbursing ?
Hollywood Park WAS the business that WAS HERE before Jimmy took Stan’s hand and the campaign contributions. Yes that was the business that provided enough parking on their own property for their guests!!
Why on earth are the billionaires not required to put in a large deposit to draw against that is replenished when city staff pays police officer’s payroll costs for each event?
Hiding the truth and playing party-man rather than accepting responsibility is a sad dysfunctional behavior not appropriate for anyone spending taxpayer money