Los Angeles County’s first budget draft for the 2026-27 fiscal year equals $48.8 billion, removes funding for 81 vacant positions but does not include any layoffs, and drops spending by about 7% from last year’s budget.
While the budget for the largest county in the nation is not robust, it is also not severe. The county’s general budget for its nearly 10 million people, supplying funding for the Sheriff’s Department, jails, healthcare, food programs, four county hospitals and several clinics, homeless services, parks, beaches and more is in a holding pattern.
The county is awaiting for huge federal cuts in Medicaid, which takes the form of Medi-Cal in the state and its counties, to come roaring in like a giant cold front in the following budget year.
The cuts from Congress and President Donald Trump from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed in July 2025 will hit more than a year from now, even though some cuts have already begun to hit county programs. The county’s Department of Health Services stands to lose about $662.2 million in federal dollars next year.
“L.A. County is currently in the eye of a hurricane,” said Acting Chief Executive Officer Joseph Nicchitta, in remarks at a briefing on Monday, April 13. The county last year prepared with cuts of 8.5% and a hiring freeze, he said. “We are doing all we can to prepare for the next phase of the storm.”
Nicchitta will present his recommended budget to the Board of Supervisors at their meeting on Tuesday, April 14, beginning at 9:30 a.m. at the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, 500 W. Temple St., in downtown Los Angeles.
In his proposed budget where spending is retrained, it only adds $63.2 million in new ongoing local funding for programs and services, a tiny fraction of nearly $50 billion.
But Nicchitta is shoring up free and reduced food programs for low-income residents by adding $40.1 million in county dollars to protect more than 1,000 Department of Public Social Services jobs while sustaining $194 million in federal and state support for CalFresh food benefits, also cut by the federal bill.
Of that $63.2 million, $12 million goes to add public defenders whose workloads have become unmanageable; $9.9 million will add 44 positions to the Office of Emergency Management. The OEM was found to be understaffed by the McChrystal Group’s after-action review. The group’s report found alerts and evacuations were part of a “series of weaknesses” that hindered the county’s emergency-alert system in sending timely notifications to residents during the Eaton and Palisades fires.
The good news: Nicchitta anticipates about $2.8 billion of unspent money from last year’s budget to be used in the coming fiscal year as one-time spending for unfinished programs, including deferred capital projects, documents show.
Some of that funding goes to payouts, including:
• $300 million payment toward a portion of the County’s first two settlements of more than $4 billion in sexual assault claims settled from those made against county employees since the 1960s and 1970s involving children in county institutions.
• $40 million to keep for future judgments and settlements. Last week, the county paid $8 million to settle a long-pending lawsuit by multiple sheriff’s deputies who alleged they were pressured to quit or leave the East Los Angeles station by an internal deputy clique known as the Banditos.
Costs from the January 2025 Palisades and Eaton wildfires that devastated communities along the coast and at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains in Altadena are another priority in the budget. The county has created two infrastructure financing districts that will leverage increased property tax revenues to help support recovery in Altadena and unincorporated Santa Monica Mountains and Sunset Mesa.
The county and state are still waiting for the governor’s request of Trump for $33.9 billion to help fire survivors. About 60% to 70% are still waiting to rebuild and many are facing financial deadlines on their temporary housing. Nicchitta said the county and state continue to negotiate with “federal partners” for financial support.
Increased revenue from property taxes are expected to inject about $334 million into the 2026-27 budget. About 60% of those funds will be used to pay cost-of-living increases to county employees, according to the budget report. Another $26.7 million is earmarked for alternatives to incarceration, including mental health and substance abuse treatment facilities and programs.
After Tuesday, the CEO’s office will work with department heads to search for cost-saving practices, and to examine raising fees for county services, Nicchitta wrote in his report. Public hearings on the recommended budget begin on May 6. Final adoption is scheduled for September.