Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass Swiftly Reverses Course Over $500K Paycheck for Wildfire Czar For 3 Months Work

Over the weekend, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass announced that her chief wildfire recovery officer, Steve Soboroff, would be paid $500,000 over the course of 90 days. Following a major public outcry, she then backtracked, saying he would be working for free.

Since January 7th, Bass has received scorching criticism for her handling of the wildfire emergency, leading many to call for her resignation. Amongst Bass’ many criticisms tied to the fires includes her cutting $17.5 million from the LAFD in the 2024-2025 city budget, deciding to travel abroad in January despite knowing that a major emergency could happen with high speed winds expected, giving a minimal response to the fires on the first day, refusing to answer press questions, having promised to never travel abroad as Mayor yet doing it anyway, and showing an overall general mismanagement of the fires once she returned to L.A.

She has even admitted that she has made some errors in handling the wildfire situation. In a CBS interview last month, Bass noted that going to Ghana was a mistake. When asked “Looking back, would you have taken that trip overseas?” she responded with a curt “No.”

In recent weeks she was also outclassed by President Donald Trump at a roundtable press meeting and has seen record low approval ratings. In addition, recall efforts are currently being built against her as an overall result.

A question of recovery

Desperately needing a victory, Bass focused much of her effort into wildfire recovery for the Palisades Fire, which burned 23,707 acres, caused 12 deaths, and led to 6,837 structures destroyed, with a further 1,017 damaged last month. In mid-January, Bass chose Soboroff, the former Police commission president and real estate developer, as her rebuilding czar. Soboroff, who was also a senior advisor to former Mayor Richard Riordan and a failed candidate in the 2001 Mayoral race, proved to be a non-controversial pick, as he has a long history of development in the city.

“He knows our communities. He knows how to activate City Hall,” said Bass last month. “Soboroff will work at warp speed to help expedite the process. He will help build out a comprehensive strategy for rebuilding and expediting the safe return of residents, workers, businesses, schools, nonprofits, libraries and parks in fire-ravaged areas.”

“This is not an urban planning exercise,” added Soboroff. “This is a saving people’s lives and family and the people that work for them and help them exercise.”

While her pick of Soboroff was looking like a needed victory for Bass, it ultimately came crashing down over the weekend when it was reported that Soboroff would be paid $500,000 from charitable organizations as compensation for the job. On top of that, real estate executive Randy Johnson, who is assisting Soboroff, would receive $250,000 for his work as well.

Lawmakers from all across the political spectrum criticized Bass for greenlighting the payments. Many were outraged over the fact that they would be getting their compensation from charitable organizations while tens of thousands of victims were struggling to get a roof over their heads. Others found the amount for only a few months work to be outrageous.

“This is infuriating,” said Los Angeles City Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez. “Philanthropic groups paying two people $750,000 is obscene.”

Special Presidential Envoy Ric Grenell and the White House representative on the ground in California, was likewise outraged. In a post on X on Saturday, he called the amount both “gross” and “offensive.”

“He’s getting paid $500,000 for 3 months of work? And they call this a charity,” said Grenell. “Gross. Offensive. I’m getting paid $0 – as are many people. It’s a good thing there will be strings on the Federal money for California.”

Most vocal, however, proved to be wildfire victims themselves.

“Soboroff should have just come up with a gun to wildfire victims and demand we put money in a bag,” wildfire victim, Larry Moore told the Globe on Monday. “It would have been a more honest approach. That was my feeling on Saturday. Bass allowed it to go through and Soboroff took it.

“Look at how many civic leaders, first responders, and others who took reduced or zero pay to help with the efforts out here because they knew the money would be needed for victims. And here’s this guy getting $5-$6 grand a day. That’s a month or two of rent for some victims. That feeds a lot of people. But nope. Bass sure knows how to pick them.”

“I wound up getting a hotel room I can’t afford and need money to get essentials,” added another victim, Stacey. “But, oh sure, take away, what, $750,000 to pay two people who lost nothing and for whom that amount means nothing to them.”

Soboroff defended himself on Saturday, saying that he deserved to paid for his work and that his compensation would not come from the city.

“I took on sweeping responsibilities, including communicating with federal agencies, and gave up other real estate and environmental consulting work for this position,” said Soboroff. “I’ve been doing this for 35 years for free on some of the biggest civic projects for the city of Los Angeles. But nobody ever asked me to drop everything. This time they did. And I said OK, under the condition that my pay not be taken out of city money, or from any wildfire survivors who would otherwise benefit from that money.

“At the end of the day, I’m doing the stuff that all these other people are just studying. I’m implementing to help people reach their goals of getting back in their houses and getting their jobs back.”

However, his response only made the situation worse.

“And they call my generation entitled,” continued Stacey. “That response was like spitting in the face of victims. Yeah, we get it, you are a busy guy. But you could have said no. You could have taken it for far less. You could have donated that $500,000 right back. There were so many right ways of doing this. And if he wasn’t super rich, the pay may have made at least a little sense.”

The backlash against Soboroff also affected Bass, whose once golden pick was now turning against her. Not needing yet another scandal, Bass, Soboroff, and Johnson came to an agreement Saturday night  in which they would work for $0.

“Steve is always there for LA. I spoke to him today and asked him to modify his agreement and work for free. He said yes,” noted Bass. “We agree that we don’t need anything distracting from the recovery work we’re doing.”

Despite Bass’ quick solution, the payment debacle still hurt her standing amongst residents, including wildfire victims.

“They’ve seen it as her and others in charge of recovery trying to pull a fast one,” LA County pollster Manny Rodriguez told the Globe Monday. “It was the sheer amount of pay for such a limited time. And it was Bass being completely insensitive to how people would feel about this and how many were not taking pay for their work. And how he was being paid too. Soboroff said he didn’t want the money from the city or from survivor funds, but any way you look at it, that money was still coming from places that could have helped others.

“This is yet another mark against Bass. She did stop this one pretty early, but the fact it was there in the first place isn’t a good look.”