LA Mayor Karen Bass Makes Final Reelection Pitch on Police, Housing

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass says she has learned from her missteps and is asking voters to give her another opportunity, telling The California Post that she plans to accelerate police recruitment and tackle the city’s growing street homelessness crisis.

In an exclusive interview with The Post, Bass said she had not realized just “how profoundly broken” Los Angeles’ homelessness response system had become. She also argued that key outside restrictions that previously limited her administration’s ability to act have now been removed.

The incumbent mayor said Friday that the experience of her first term could help rebuild trust with disappointed voters, including residents still coping with the devastating January 2025 wildfires that began while she was in Ghana.

Asked to identify her greatest regret, Bass gave a direct answer. “The biggest regret is most obviously that I wasn’t here,” she said.

Bass highlighted the work of her staff in helping affected residents rebuild, along with her efforts to secure assistance during trips to Sacramento and Washington. Still, she acknowledged that those actions have not changed public perceptions.

“I’m a workhorse and not a show horse, and I’ve paid for it politically,” she said.

If she wins another term, Bass said she would work to expand the LAPD to 9,500 officers by the 2028 Olympics, restructure the city’s homeless housing system and increase access to mental health and addiction services designed to help people leave the streets permanently.

A central part of her public safety agenda is fixing Los Angeles’ lengthy police hiring process, which can take as long as a year before recruits officially join the department. Her goal is to rebuild the LAPD to 9,500 officers.

Bass has already removed the head of the Personnel Department, the agency responsible for city hiring, and signed an executive directive seeking to reduce the recruitment timeline to 180 days.

“Staffing up the department after years of decline is one of my top priorities. We’re cutting the red tape and streamlining processes to turn that around,” she said.

The administration’s plan calls for filling police academy classes more quickly, moving recruits through training faster and hiring new officers at a pace that outstrips retirements and other departures.

The LAPD had approximately 8,550 sworn officers in July, marking its smallest force in almost 25 years. That figure is down from about 10,000 officers in 2020.

Although the city budget provides for 510 new hires this year, retirements and resignations could erase much of that progress. Municipal projections estimate the department will have only 8,555 officers by summer 2027 — far below Bass’ target.

Bass also offered strong support for LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell. Her election opponent, City Councilwoman Nithya Raman, has said she would seek to replace him before his current term expires in 2030.

“I think that she doesn’t have a clue what is needed in terms of recruiting and hiring a police chief,” Bass said.

The mayor said her nationwide search for McDonnell lasted 10 months and warned that removing him could leave Los Angeles with a new police chief only six months before the Olympics. “That’s insanity,” she said.

Homelessness remains another major challenge for Bass, with the city’s unsheltered population rising to 45,194 from 41,980 when she took office in 2022. The 2026 count recorded a 3.4% increase over the previous year, while street homelessness climbed 7.9% after declining for two consecutive years.

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“I knew the system was broken, but how profoundly broken it was, I did not know,” Bass said. “The system was never designed to end homelessness. It was only set up to manage,” she added.

Bass is seeking a sweeping overhaul that would give Los Angeles greater authority over homeless housing funded by the city.

At present, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority distributes housing across the county. That arrangement means units paid for with city funds can be assigned to people from outside Los Angeles, even as thousands of residents remain homeless on the city’s streets.

“In many, many cases, they (the homeless) were not people from Los Angeles,” Bass said.

Her solution is a new city-county agreement giving LA access to the regional homelessness database and greater authority over placements into city-funded housing.

Approved in principle by city and county leaders, the agreement would allow LA to prioritize people living on its streets rather than relying on a countywide system that doesn’t automatically give them preference.

Bass believes the change could help “end the majority of street homelessness,” including sprawling encampments that have frustrated residents for years.

She also wants to expand mental health and addiction treatment.

“If you just take people randomly off the street and put them in an apartment and just expect them to magically heal… it’s naive,” she said.

A California Post/McLaughlin poll conducted Oct. 15-19 found Raman leading Bass 46.7% to 38.8%, with 13.5% of potential voters undecided.

Just 25.5% approved of Bass’s job performance, while 71.7% disapproved.

A newer UC Berkeley/Los Angeles Times poll showed the candidates tied at 40%, with 19% undecided, but found 65% of likely voters viewed Bass unfavorably.

Bass acknowledged she spent too little time communicating her administration’s accomplishments.

“I didn’t focus on that. That was a mistake,” she said.

With Tuesday’s election looming, Bass is asking voters for more time to deliver results that eluded her first term, framing the race as a choice between building on her progress or trying an untested approach.

“We are at a crossroads where we can soar into the future,” she said, “or we can throw our city up for experimentation on different theories and ideas.”