Confronted with fierce criticisms of the scheduled salary of his head of the reanalysis of the recovery of fires of $ 500,000 for 90 days of work, the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, reversed the course on Saturday evening and said that Steve Soboroff would not receive any compensation.
The initial salary of Soboroff, which would have been entirely funded by charitable organizations, was reported for the first time by the Times early Saturday morning. Soboroff had defended the arrangement, saying that his expertise asserted the price.
After his overthrow, Bass said in a press release: “Steve is still there for the. I spoke to him today and asked him to change his agreement and work for free. He said yes. We agree that we have nothing to distract from the recovery work that we do. »»
When Bass hit Soboroff for the first time to intervene last month as a TSAR for the recovery of forest fires, the property developer seemed ready to provide an essential political elevator to a mayor whose first emergency intervention had weakened.
As a long -standing civic leader who has raised his family in the Pacific palisades, Soboroff provided the mayor with a direct line to the community sparkled by fires. And he was already well known for his work developing thousands of houses in Playa Vista.
But the revelation that Soboroff was paid $ 500,000 over three months attracted reprimands of residents of Palisades and several public figures, threatening to undermine his effectiveness in helping the mayor restore confidence in the city and his reconstruction efforts.
Soboroff, who had spoken to Times earlier about criticism, refused to comment on Saturday evening beyond confirming that he would work free of charge.
After the Times initially pointed out Soboroff’s salary, several residents of Pacific Palisades expressed its indignation on Saturday.
The member of the Municipal Council Monica Rodriguez, who sits on the Council Committee of five members supervising the recovery, also expressed his anger against the amount, the appellant “obscene”.
Rodriguez said that it was “exasperating” that philanthropic groups provide $ 750,000 for only two people – $ 500,000 for Soboroff, plus $ 250,000 for Longtime Real Estate Director Randy Johnson, who will report to Soboroff during reconstruction efforts.
Bass said on Saturday evening that Johnson would also work without salary, saying that she was “grateful for her generosity and expertise”.
The mayor’s team refused to appoint the charitable organizations which were to covered Soboroff’s salary. It is not clear how these organizations had collected money or towards what otherwise. But Rodriguez had wondered if the donors of these groups knew how their money would be used.
Ric Grenell, who is President Trump’s envoy for special missions, also spoke up early Saturday, calling Soboroff’s salary “offensive” in an article on X.
“I am paid $ 0 – just like many people,” wrote Grenell, who sat next to Trump during a round table in Pacific Palisades last month. “It’s a good thing that there will be strings on federal money for California.”
Bass suggested earlier this week that the extent of Soboroff’s work could be decreased, saying that it would mainly focus on the reconstruction of the historic business district of the Palisades. Soboroff challenged this notion, claiming that it regularly interacts with federal agencies.
Asked about the criticisms of Rodriguez and others, Soboroff declared earlier on Saturday that his salary was justified by his specialized expertise and the radical tasks he assured. He said that he put aside other real estate and environmental consultation works – losing this potential income – to focus exclusively on the recovery efforts for forest fires.
Soboroff previously sat on the council of police commissioners and the commission which oversees the ministry of recreation and parks – the two volunteer positions.
“I have been doing this for 35 years for 35 years on some of the biggest civic projects for the city of Los Angeles. But no one has ever asked me to drop everything. This time, they did it, “said Soboroff, 76.” And I said OK, under the condition that my salary is not withdrawn from the city’s money, or any survivor of forest fires which otherwise benefit from this money. “”
Bass named Soboroff as his recovery tsar on January 17. For weeks, neither he nor the mayor’s team would explain how he had to be compensated, nor how much.
On Friday, he appeared at a morning press conference on the recovery of forest fires, Bass and Soboroff again refused to say how paid it would be. Ten hours later, after additional requests from the Times, the mayor’s team published the information.
In this email, Bass spokesperson Zach Seidl underlined the vast Soboroff record in business and on the city commissions, saying: “There is simply no one like Steve.”
The controversy on Soboroff’s salary marked the second time in just over a week that Bass reversed a decision after criticism.
Last week, she said that the Pacific Palisades would reopen to the public, which caused a large frustration of residents and the member of the City Council Traci Park for the risks of crime and security. The mayor later announced that the neighborhood would remain closed.
Pacific Palisades resident Larry Vein, whose house has undergone damage caused by smoke, criticized the provision of Soboroff wages on Saturday morning, saying that no one should supervise the recovery of “financial gain”.
Steve Danton, who lost his house in the fire in the Palisades and lives in a temporary apartment in Marina Del Rey, had an even stronger reaction, describing Soboroff’s compensation to “grasp money”.
Danton, whose family has lived in the Pacific palisades since 1999, said that the city had experienced a “leadership crisis” since the fires broke out. The lack of transparency around Soboroff’s salary has only added to community frustrations, he said.
Soboroff defended his work earlier on Saturday, saying that he had pushed the mayor to hire an external project manager to guide municipal agencies through the replacement work of damaged or destroyed infrastructure such as street networks, systems of ‘Sanitation and the Pacific Palisades branch of the Los Angeles public library. Since he took his post, Soboroff said he has also made recommendations on the city’s authorization process, coordinated with federal agencies and asked questions of “thousands of residents”.
“In the end, I do what all these others are studying,” he said. “I take care to help people achieve their return objectives in their homes and recover their jobs.”
Bass and Soboroff were a strange couple.
Sometimes Soboroff spoke of the mayor while they answered the media questions, forcing her to make her way in the conversation.
And Bass left Soboroff out of the loop on at least a key decision – the move last week, reversed later, to reopen the Pacific palisades to the public.
California Daily Newspapers
