The top of the Los Angeles Homeless Companies Authority tendered her resignation Monday over a disagreement with the group’s board in regards to the salaries of its lowest–paid staffers.
Heidi Marston, LAHSA’s government director, leaves at a pivotal second as elections within the metropolis and county — together with the decision of a years-long authorized battle over homelessness in Los Angeles — might alter the technique for a way the area addresses its homeless inhabitants.
Marston began within the job in an interim capability in 2019 and oversaw the company, which is a joint-powers authority between the town and county of Los Angeles, all through the COVID-19 pandemic. She was instrumental in serving to coordinate and arrange a community of rented resorts the place homeless individuals susceptible to the virus might keep in particular person rooms.
When she began, she stated in her letter to the board saying her departure, LAHSA staff had been making as little as $33,000 and the group was experiencing an infinite quantity of turnover in consequence. In March 2021, Marston raised the annual wage of 196 staff at LAHSA to $50,000 and froze the compensation of the group’s 10 highest-paid staffers, in line with the letter.
The group’s oversight fee, which is made up of people who find themselves appointed by metropolis and county politicians, questioned her determination.
“Since making this determination, I’ve been accused of undermining ‘administration’s place’ in re-negotiating LAHSA’s new Union Contract,” she wrote in a letter to board saying her deliberate departure.
“My determination to extend LAHSA’s compensation flooring to $50,000, in addition to my determination to freeze compensation will increase for our most highly-compensated staff, addressed the everlasting want — in addition to the urgent want of this second in historical past — to align our commitments and values at each degree of our work.”
Neither Marston nor members of LAHSA’s board of commissioners instantly responded to a request to remark. In her letter Marston stated her resignation would take impact Could 27.
This story can be up to date as extra data turns into out there.
