{"id":181392,"date":"2025-08-28T03:20:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-28T03:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/181392\/"},"modified":"2025-08-28T03:20:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T03:20:11","slug":"l-a-city-council-balks-at-5-million-request-for-law-firm-in-homelessness-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/181392\/","title":{"rendered":"L.A. City Council balks at $5-million request for law firm in homelessness case"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Los Angeles City Council stopped short on Wednesday of giving an additional $5 million<\/a> to a law firm hired to defend the city in a long running homelessness case, sending the question to a committee for additional vetting.<\/p>\n

City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto had asked the council to provide a nearly sixfold increase<\/a> in her office\u2019s contract with Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, taking the cost up to $5.9 million.<\/p>\n

The council voted in May to provide Gibson Dunn $900,000 for up to three years of work. Over the following three months, the law firm blew way past that amount, racking up $3.2 million in bills.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, we are not happy, and not ready to pay that bill that we didn\u2019t bargain for,\u201d Councilmember Bob Blumenfield said. \u201cWe were supposed to have been notified when they were exceeding that amount. It\u2019s written in the contract that we were supposed to be notified at different levels. We were not notified.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, after meeting behind closed doors for more than 90 minutes, the council sent Feldstein Soto\u2019s request to the powerful budget committee for more review.<\/p>\n

Blumenfield, who sits on that committee, did not offer a timeline for taking up Feldstein Soto\u2019s request. However, he said he wants the city attorney to go back to Gibson Dunn to ensure that \u201ctaxpayers are better served.\u201d<\/p>\n

The L.A. Alliance sued in 2020, saying the city was doing too little to move people homeless people indoors and address the concentration of encampments in Skid Row and elsewhere. The group eventually reached a settlement<\/a> with the city that required, among other things, the construction of homeless housing beds and the removal of encampments.<\/p>\n

As part of the settlement, the city must provide 12,915 homeless beds or other housing opportunities, such as rental vouchers, by June 2027. L.A. also must remove 9,800 homeless encampments, such as tents or recreational vehicles, by June 2026.<\/p>\n

Lawyers for the L.A. Alliance contend the city has repeatedly fallen short of the obligations spelled out in the settlement. In May, the group attempted to persuade U.S. District Judge David O. Carter to seize control over the city\u2019s homeless initiatives and turn them over to a third-party receiver.<\/p>\n

Gibson Dunn waged an aggressive defense of the city\u2019s actions, issuing hundreds of objections and working to undermine key witness testimony. <\/p>\n

Carter ultimately rejected the request to appoint a receiver, but also concluded that the city had breached the settlement agreement in several ways.<\/p>\n

Feldstein Soto did not immediately comment on the council\u2019s action. She has previously praised the law firm, saying through a spokesperson that it \u201cdelivered exceptional results and seamless representation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The city is now planning to appeal portions of the judge\u2019s order. Feldstein Soto said some of the additional $5 million would go toward work on that appeal, with Gibson Dunn representing the city through June 2027, according to a confidential memo reviewed by The Times.<\/p>\n

In her memo, Feldstein Soto commended Gibson Dunn for preserving the city\u2019s control over its homeless programs and preventing several elected officials from being ordered to testify.<\/p>\n

Blumenfield also offered praise for Gibson Dunn, saying he appreciates the firm\u2019s \u201cgood work for the city.\u201d Nevertheless, he also wants Feldstein Soto to look for ways of cutting costs.<\/p>\n

\u201cSending it to committee sends a message \u2014 which is, we don\u2019t like what was put before us for lots of reasons,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Councilmember Monica Rodriguez voiced disappointment with Wednesday\u2019s action, saying her colleagues were \u201ckicking the can down the road.\u201d Rodriguez, who opposed the $5-million contract increase, said the council should have rejected Feldstein Soto\u2019s request outright.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe issue remains unresolved,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m frustrated and unhappy with it, because frankly I think it enables bad behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matthew Umhofer, an attorney representing the L.A. Alliance, said he is \u201cheartened that the city didn\u2019t give this misadventure a blank check.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m hopeful the City Council committee scrutinizes this,\u201d he said, \u201cand asks the important question of whether spending $6 million on an outside firm to avoid accountability is a good use of taxpayer funds.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles City Council stopped short on Wednesday of giving an additional $5 million to a law…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":181393,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[1582,276,2451,102314,6283,39990,78629,5169,102316,102315,37960,4155,12916,2961,36391,224,5337,43855,10495,8066],"class_list":{"0":"post-181392","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-city","11":"tag-committee","12":"tag-council","13":"tag-encampment","14":"tag-gibson-dunn","15":"tag-group","16":"tag-homeless-housing-bed","17":"tag-homelessness-case","18":"tag-hydee-feldstein-soto","19":"tag-june","20":"tag-l-a-alliance","21":"tag-la","22":"tag-law-firm","23":"tag-los-angeles","24":"tag-losangeles","25":"tag-request","26":"tag-settlement","27":"tag-work"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115104240411093167","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}