Over the past week, the raging wildfires in Los Angeles County have laid bare the ineptitude and misguided priorities of leadership at every level from the state to local government. Scrutiny of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has particularly intensified, and for good reason. For starters, she was in Ghana as the fires broke out, despite a pledge not to travel abroad. The optics were horrible, but the real scandal dates back at least two months.
In November, LAFD Chief Kristin Crowley sent a memo warning of severe staffing shortages and training gaps. The department was dangerously undermanned, yet the mayor’s office reportedly ignored or even buried the warning.
“Los Angeles fire chief Kristin Crowley warned city officials in November that her department had about half as many firefighters as it needed,” reports the Washington Free Beacon. “When deadly wildfires struck the city two months later, Mayor Karen Bass's administration pulled Crowley's memo from its website.”
The report reveals that on November 18, Crowley wrote to the city’s fire commissioners — a five-member board appointed by Bass — urging them to relay her concerns to Bass and the city council. She highlighted that the fire department’s staffing levels had remained stagnant for decades, even as the city’s population grew significantly.
"In many ways, the current staffing, deployment model, and size of the LAFD have not changed since the 1960s," Crowley wrote, noting that a surge in emergency calls combined with a shortage of fire stations had resulted in longer response times.
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Crowley’s memo also pointed out that in 2022, 61% of the department’s firefighters failed to meet the national standard of a four-minute first response time. The National Fire Protection Association recommends a ratio of 1.51 to 1.81 firefighters per 1,000 residents for cities like Los Angeles, but according to Crowley, the city only maintains 0.91 firefighters per 1,000 people.
Two months later, historic wildfires erupted across the Los Angeles area. Since last week, 37,000 acres and more than 12,000 structures have burned, 16 people have died, and more than 150,000 are under evacuation orders.
As the catastrophe unfolded, Crowley's memo disappeared from a city website. The New York Times referenced the memo in a Thursday piece but did not link to it. The memo was available online at this link as recently as Friday. By Saturday night, however, the memo was replaced with a message stating, "404! We are sorry, but the page you requested was not found." A Google search preview includes Crowley's quote on the inadequate "size of the LAFD."
In April, Crowley requested a significant budget increase to recruit firefighters and boost wildfire suppression efforts amid expected retirements. Instead, Mayor Bass approved a budget that cut the department’s funding by $17 million compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, Crowley herself has faced criticism for prioritizing woke DEI initiatives over hiring firefighters and general preparedness.
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