The funding allocation, part of the county’s $48.8-billion budget proposal unveiled Monday, would bring on 10 new people to the small team prosecuting alleged fraud within the county’s historic $4-billion sex abuse settlement. L.A. County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman announced the probe last November following a Times investigation that found nine people who said they were paid to sue.
The county has agreed to pay billions to settle more than 11,000 claims of sex abuse in juvenile halls and foster homes, a flood of lawsuits spurred by a 2020 law changing the statute of limitations. Since those settlements, more than 5,000 new lawsuits have been filed with an average of 150 new claims coming in per month, according to the county, raising the prospect of future costly payouts.
Acting Chief Executive Joseph Nicchitta said Monday the new filings would continue to be an “anchor” around the county’s finances.
“It is something that’s going to weigh on us going forward,” he said at a news conference announcing the new spending plan.
Hochman said in a statement that the investigation was a priority for his office and the money would be used to “pursue every credible lead and hold fraudsters accountable.”
“It is our pledge to the real survivors of childhood sexual abuse that we will root out and prosecute those who manufactured false claims and profited or tried to profit from those lies,” Hochman said. “As for those who filed fraudulent claims of sex abuse, the time is growing short for you to turn yourselves in before you are arrested, prosecuted and punished.”
Nicchitta made a pitch for legislative change, noting the county was looking to Sacramento to “eliminate loopholes allowing abusive practices by attorneys that inject weak and potentially fraudulent claims into settlement pools.”
The push by the county to change the law has been hotly criticized by some advocates who accuse government officials of trampling on victims’ rights.
“These reforms that we are seeking are anti-fraud,” said Nicchitta. “They are not anti-survivor.”
The payouts are yet another cloud looming over the budget proposal, along with rising labor costs and federal funding cuts. The recommended budget represents a 7% decrease in spending compared to the current plan. But Nicchitta said Monday it wasn’t all doom and gloom, with the county managing to stave off layoffs and program cut
The upcoming budget proposal, he said, represented the calm before the next big wave of potential rollbacks.
“Remember, we’re in the eye of the hurricane,” he said.
The budget forecast was notably rosier than last year’s, in which the county was saddled with $2 billion in new wildfire costs and had made the first round of slashes to finance the sex abuse payouts. The county froze hiring at the time and made most departments shrink their budgets by 3%.
Those cuts, Nicchitta said, went deep enough that they can avoid major slashes this upcoming fiscal year, though he warned the fallout from the Trump administration’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” will soon wreak fresh havoc on the county’s finances. Health officials say they expect more than $2 billion to be cut from the budget for health services over the next three years.
Costs from wildfire will also continue to weigh on the county’s coffers. Officials say the federal government has yet to respond to a February request for rebuilding aid. Nicchitta said he was “optimistic” the money would soon be made available.
Growth from property taxes has given the county a small new pot of funds, which will be used largely to pay for increased salaries for county workers. An additional $12 million will go to public defenders, who say they’re buckling under untenably heavy caseloads, while the Office of Emergency Management will get roughly $10 million to add 44 positions, according to the proposal.
The office, which is responsible for coordinating during emergencies, was under scrutiny following the alert failures of the Eaton fire, and officials had promised in the aftermath to revamp the small office.
The supervisors will be briefed on the budget plan Tuesday.
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