EDITORIAL NO ON F.

City Hall lacks the credibility to be trusted with yet more public moneyCITY Hall is reaching for your pocketbook - again.

In the city of Los Angeles, there's a single local initiative on the November ballot, Proposition F, which promises to bring the city all sorts of goodies - firefighters, paramedics, helicopters, animal shelters and more! - all for the mere price of $532 million in city debt, paid for with higher property taxes.

The Daily News recommends a no vote.

The City Council, which crafted Proposition F, promises that the bond wouldn't cost the average taxpayer much - only $2.80 a month. But that's on top of an already staggering local tax bill, at a time when the return for public services hardly seems to measure up.

Council members must be hoping that Angelenos will forget about the long history of other citywide bond measures, like Proposition BB, which promised better schools, but has delivered waste and bloat instead.

They must be hoping that Angelenos also forget that the city ignored the paramedic shortage for years until a recent series of Daily News stories prompted a response. Even now, City Hall requires all paramedics to be trained as firefighters - thereby making the hiring and deployment of new paramedics overly expensive.

Until city government learns to spend the public's money more honestly and efficiently, it doesn't deserve a penny more.

Nor does it need more money as much as more economical spending - even in this time of economic boom and surpluses.

City Hall had little trouble whipping up a $4 million donation to the Democratic Party for the convention last summer. And it seems unconcerned about raising the $45 million it will cost to pay the federal government to run the Los Angeles Police Department.

No way on Proposition F. The city already does too little with too much. F stands for Fraud. Vote no.