L.A. fire chief meets with mayor after saying the city failed her agency
- Share via
As firefighters continued to battle massive wildfires Friday, Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley stunned many observers with an extraordinary television interview.
Crowley, pressed by a Fox 11 reporter, said the city of Los Angeles — and by implication, her boss, Mayor Karen Bass — had failed her and her department. She went on to describe the Fire Department as understaffed and underfunded, saying the situation is “no longer sustainable.”
Hours later, Crowley was inside Bass’ office for a meeting so long that it intruded on the mayor’s nightly media briefing on the wildfires. Bass ultimately missed the briefing, where she had been billed as a featured speaker.
While one group of reporters waited for the briefing to start, another, smaller contingent camped outside the mayor’s office. Both parties received a jolt when the Daily Mail reported on its website that Bass had fired Crowley.
Bass spokesperson Zach Seidl said that was not true. So did the Fire Department, which issued a statement saying that Bass’ and Crowley’s “foremost priorities continue to be fighting the current wildfires and safeguarding Angelenos.”
“It is important to note that the Fire Chief was not dismissed and is in full command of the LAFD,” said the statement, posted by spokesperson Erik Scott on X.
Employee raises and other expenses are expanding the Los Angeles Fire Department’s budget. At the same time, the agency has had to scale back operations in recent months.
Friday’s developments added to the sense of chaos surrounding the devastating wildfires, which have destroyed portions of Pacific Palisades and Malibu as well as Altadena, an unincorporated area outside the city of Los Angeles, killing at least 13 people.
With Crowley’s remarks, tensions between her and Bass over Fire Department funding had exploded into the open.
Some at City Hall privately wondered whether Crowley’s outspokenness would cost her job. Before her meeting with the mayor, the chief told her staff she expected to be fired, according to a source familiar with the discussion.
On Saturday morning, Bass appeared with Crowley at yet another wildfire briefing, telling reporters that she and the chief are “focused on fighting these fires.” Standing near Crowley, Bass said she had had no intention of firing the chief at their meeting the previous day.
“As you see here, the chief and I are lockstep in our No. 1 mission, and that mission is to get us past this emergency right now,” Bass said. “We want to make sure we save lives, we save housing, we save businesses. And if there are differences that we have, we will continue to deal with those in private.”
Crowley echoed those views, saying she and Bass had met to discuss their shared priorities. “We are both focused on our urgent needs to mitigate these devastating wildfires,” she said.
Still, Crowley’s views on Fire Department spending have been anything but private.
On television networks Friday, she hammered home the idea that her department had gone with too little for too long. “We can no longer sustain where we are,” she told anchor Jake Tapper on CNN.
Crowley told Tapper that her department does not have enough firefighters. She also said the agency lacks enough mechanics to repair broken-down emergency vehicles.
At one point, Tapper asked whether budget cuts hurt her agency’s ability to fight the ongoing wildfires.
“I want to be very, very clear. Yes. We took a $17-million budget cut,” she responded. “And as we know, any budget cut would negatively affect our ability to carry out our mission.”
Bass has rejected the idea that there was any connection between reductions at the department and the city’s response to the wildfires.
City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo, who helps prepare the city budget, said the department’s budget is expected to grow by more than 7% this year, once new firefighter pay raises and vehicle purchases are factored in. The department faced no financial constraints on the number of firefighters who responded to the blazes, or how long they worked, Szabo said.
Crowley was hired in 2022 by then-Mayor Eric Garcetti, becoming the first woman to run a department that has long struggled to recruit female firefighters. A department employee for more than two decades, she has been a frequent presence at news conferences since the fires broke out, updating the media on firefighting efforts.
During her tenure, she has not been shy about advocating for her department’s budget.
Last month, she sent a memo to Bass’ appointees on the Board of Fire Commissioners expressing serious concerns about the city’s decision to eliminate dozens of vacant non-firefighter positions at her agency.
Gov. Gavin Newsom orders independent investigation into how the loss of water pressure left fire hydrants dry, hindering firefighting efforts in Los Angeles.
In that document, Crowley also expressed alarm over what she described as a $7-million reduction in overtime variable staffing hours, or “v-hours.” That cut, she said in the memo, “severely limited the department’s capacity to prepare for, train for, and respond to large-scale emergencies, including wildfires.”
In the Fox 11 interview, Crowley went further, saying the department has not received the funding necessary to serve the city’s population. The department, she said, should double the number of firefighters and add 62 fire stations.
“The Fire Department needs to be funded appropriately so that I can look any community members in the eye and say, ‘Your LAFD’s got your back,’” she said.
“And right now you can’t?” Fox 11 reporter Gigi Graciette responded.
“Right now? No,” Crowley said. “And that’s why I’m here.”
City Councilmember Traci Park, who represents Pacific Palisades, praised Crowley for her job performance and her advocacy. Park, standing inside the city’s Emergency Operations Center on Friday, said the Fire Department has been the subject of “chronic, decades-long under-investment.”
“The issues that she is speaking to are really important,” she said.
Sign up for Essential California
The most important California stories and recommendations in your inbox every morning.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
