Layoffs loom in Cal City; private documents leaked

Private documents leaked on social media reveal a proposal to lay off 24 city employees; a pay increase for the acting city manager is on the council meeting agenda.

• Private documents can be seen here... Proposed FY24-25 Cuts Layoff
  
• Pay raise for acting city manager includes raise of nearly $74,000.
• A layoff proposal was drawn up during a closed meeting and later leaked on social media.

BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:

Most residents in California City know that layoffs are coming due to budget cuts... from the failed special tax in the March election.

But thanks to social media... everyone knows the specifics...

I'm Steve Virgen, your neighborhood reporter...

Private documents leaked to Facebook revealed the proposal to lay off 24 city employees...

This comes as council members will talk about a pay 'increase' for the acting city manager on Tuesday's meeting agenda.

"It's a whole drama culture area to talk about the city, talk about all the problems in California City. There are not many solutions that I found on there. It's just complaints."

Cal City mayor Kelly Kulikoff is talking about what happens on Facebook.

Most recently, private documents were leaked on a few pages.

And commenters expressed frustration that a salary increase is positioned for Latisha Lamberth. She has been serving two roles since March, including human resources director.

The raise would up her pay by nearly 74,000 dollars, making her salary 185,000 dollars per year.

"The Acting City Manager, she's here like 15, 16 hours a day. She comes really early and she's the last to leave."

Harvey Brown, the union president and a city employee, could not go on camera because he was working on Monday, but he did provide a statement.

"The morale has been low for a while, and now it is worse because of the item on the agenda for the city council meeting Tuesday to increase an employee's salary while several other employees are slated to be laid off.

The only thing that we want is for fair treatment across the board, for all city employees."

VO: Brown added he's concerned that employees will be overworked with understaffing.

"When we're in tough times and we don't have the resources, we need volunteers. Otherwise, we're set for failure," Kulikoff said.

You can see the layoff proposal documents here...

Proposed FY24-25 Cuts Layoff

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