Council Member Accuses Bass’ Office of “Botched” Fire Recovery

Tensions over the lack of transparency in “who’s calling the shots” on the fire recovery boiled over this week as a contractor sought approval of $8 million for rebuilding work.

“We’ve had a lot of false starts from the beginning of this, from the mayor appointing someone to be the director of this recovery to that [person] abandoning ship, to then [disaster recovery firm] Hagerty — we are 10 months [post-fires] …. This is bullshit,” Council member Monica Rodriguez said during the Ad Hoc Committee for LA Recovery special meeting on Monday. “I can’t believe that we’re in a situation where we’re still here. It feels like we’re circling the drain, and I don’t know who’s calling the shots from the mayor’s office.”

Rodriguez, who is a member of the ad hoc committee, was responding to a request made to her and her peers to approve moving $8 million from the city budget to the Bureau of Engineering. That money would be used to pay for work AECOM on current rebuilding efforts and map out the long-term recovery.

The requested $8 million won’t be paid to AECOM immediately. Rather, the allocation, which was ultimately approved with stipulations, will make the money available for the Bureau of Engineering to pay the firm as work is delivered.

With little to show since AECOM’s contract was announced in June, Rodriguez voiced frustration over the money request.

“Why are we continuing to play with all these other things [related to the long-term] when all it’s doing is delaying the implementation of an actual plan to get shovels into the ground immediately?” Rodriguez asked.

Traci Park, who chairs the ad hoc committee, expressed concern about whether there was a less costly option, considering “I can’t even find funding for the Department of Building and Safety to hire an outside contractor to clear the toxic debris and rubble out of the Palisades Bowl.”

The Pacific Palisades Bowl Mobile Estates community on Pacific Coast Highway remains uncleared, preventing tenants from returning and also creating what Park called a “toxic soup.”

Representatives for Rodriguez did not respond to a request for comment on the council member’s statements.

The mayor’s office responded to the critiques generally instead of directly addressing Rodriguez or Park.

“While some in the city criticize without providing solutions, Mayor Bass remains focused on leading the fastest disaster recovery effort in modern California history and on getting families home — full stop,” a spokesperson from the mayor’s office said in a statement provided to The Real Deal on Tuesday. “Mayor Bass recognizes that recovering from a disaster of this magnitude requires working with all levels of government, philanthropic partners and experts in the private sector to get families home. She will continue to do that.”

Approved with contingencies

The contract with AECOM, which has headquarters in Dallas and an office in Downtown Los Angeles, was a follow-on move to a work solicitation first released by the city in January. That solicitation ultimately led to AECOM being tapped in May for work that included overarching management of the recovery plan, infrastructure restoration and fire protection planning and logistics and traffic management.

The total cost of that work was $5 million and due in 120 days. Additional work on longer-term planning was then added by Mayor Karen Bass’ office, tacking on another $3 million.

AECOM began work earlier this year meeting with residents and city departments, in addition to working on three plans that are viewed as key to supporting the massive construction zone that’s expected in the Palisades in the coming years. Those three outlines address infrastructure restoration, fire protection and logistics and operations.

The three reports have not been presented to the ad hoc recovery committee, prompting the three members present at Monday’s meeting to approve paying AECOM an amount not to exceed $5 million for the work that’s been done. Any additional payments are subject to review and approval by the committee, once they see the three reports within the next month.

“Botched” job

Rodriguez’s comments come as the one-year anniversary of the Palisades and Eaton fires looms, with much of the public communication on the recovery being spearheaded by Bass’ office.

How decisions are being made within the mayor’s office was a key question asked Monday, given several key decisions being made without full council approval.

In July, Rodriguez confirmed to TRD she had learned of the contracts with Hagerty and AECOM at the same time as the public, when Bass’ office issued press releases.

“The challenge I have — and this is not about AECOM — it’s just procedurally how things are being authorized is we’re being forced to be pot committed,” Rodriguez said during Monday’s meeting. “That is, you’ve gone ahead, and you started doing all of this [community] engagement and work and now they come to us and say, ‘Oh, by the way, you’re not going to get the final product until you approve an $8 million transfer’…. That’s just not how business should be done.”

Rodriguez said Bass’ office “totally botched the first few months of this recovery.”

To date, the mayor has tapped developer Steve Soboroff in January to serve as chief recovery officer. Well publicized disputes related to pay and Soboroff’s scope of authority led to the severing of ties after 90 days in the position. That was followed up with the mayor’s office announcing in February a contract struck with Illinois-based disaster recovery firm Hagerty Consulting for what a spokesperson in the mayor’s office described earlier this year as “planning, response, recovery, financial management and operations.”

The Hagerty contract was not to exceed $10 million, according to the contract. The deal was criticized from the time it was announced for the lack of transparency around the approval process as some wondered about the qualifications of an out-of-state firm.

A late October report from the City Administrative Officer confirmed similarities in the work of Hagerty and AECOM, indicating the “phasing out of Hagerty’s support” last month.