It’s been a little over a year in the making, and will probably take another year to complete but here it is:

Despite a chorus of complaints from community activists, a City Council committee advanced a plan Monday to lay off up to 1,500 workers and slash spending across the board - including the previously untouched Los Angeles fire and police departments.

The aim of the plan is to make $400 million in cuts to help close a massive budget deficit. While Los Angeles officials say some layoffs can be averted if unions agree to concessions, they say they must plan for the worst.

With that in mind, Councilman Bernard Parks moved to include police and fire departments on the list of agencies facing cuts.

“We are asking you to give us a plan with no restrictions,” Councilman Bernard Parks, chair of the Budget and Finance committee, told City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana at a committee hearing.

“You cannot balance the budget when 70 percent is tied up in police and fire services. It is the elephant in the room that no one is talking about.”

I’d say that is a pretty skewed budget, wouldn’t you? And it is more than high time that it was talked about. Of course I’m a pariah for not immediately agreeing to the simpleton’s theory that more police/fire = more protection. When I was a young boy in Miami this same logic was being applied to deal with the cocaine wars. The city hired anyone and everyone they could strap a gun to, and wouldn’t you know that it didn’t work out. And while there’s plenty more instances of police misconduct I can point to for a case, the simple fact of the matter is that our security is simply unsustainable.

Tony Villar disagrees with most of the public and the council:

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has resisted efforts to cut police below the current level of 9,963 officers, saying public safety has to be the city’s top priority.

What a swell guy he is, with his (one and only) 24/7 police security detail. Please let that number of 9,000+ scare you, the goal has been 10,000. In addition we also have the LA County Sheriff’s department ballooning at about 20,000 employees. Of course, to hear people like Tony VIllar tell it, some of the largest employers in the state (larger than almost any private company by measure) is in a constant state of need.

Both of these departments (police and fire) now represent 70 percent of our budget. Yes, we will continue to lose services for this “luxury” I suppose. However, this will probably be the last year that Villar can get away with this, and the Council already has sent this cholo a little bitch slap. It makes for a good story to save a pooch from a river, but forgive me if I’m balking at it for seventy percent of the city budget.