L.A.'s red ink could cross over the thin blue line

Los Angeles' increasingly dire financial health raises serious doubt about the once sacrosanct pledge to keep LAPD's ranks at the current record high of just less than 10,000 officers. Daily News.

Now, many city officials acknowledge that the Los Angeles Police Department will not escape the chopping block as they look for ways to make up a $700 million shortfall over the next 18 months.

Meanwhile, financial pressures and court orders are forcing the state to release thousands of inmates early from overcrowded prisons, into an economy with double-digit unemployment.