I agree with you. The article states that the budget for L.A. city is $6.5 billion per year and that sounds about right. I've read that LAUSD's annual budget is larger than the city's, but I'm sure it's not $30 billion.
These numbers need to be verified.
I'm too lazy to do that right now. ;^)
as an ex-LAUSD retired uncredentialed worker, I know about the mis-management and waste in the schools. There is so much waste and unethical matters in the ‘facility support’ and ‘transportation’ departments. Major leaders in those divisions were caught in abusing their responsibilities and were only moved around to another geographical area with a small letter reprimand in their personel files. Staff were never prosecuted criminally or had to pay back those misused moneys.
Years ago, schools were to be totally non-political and unpartisan to not complicate matters. Now the schools are used to prop-up and campaigne for major elected officials or their pet views in LA. (One example was students walking out of schools to protest the enforcement of established federal immigration laws.) It makes a bad LAUSD situation much worse. It should be breaken up because it’s too large.