EDITORIAL VOTE NO ON MEASURE A.

ALL of Los Angeles County needs a lot more police officers and sheriff's deputies - that, no one can deny.

Between the scourge of gangs and the threat of terrorist attacks, law enforcement agencies are badly understaffed to fulfill their mission. They have been for decades due to short-sighted budget decisions made by county supervisors, the Los Angeles City Council and the city councils of many smaller towns.

Given the leadership of Chief William Bratton and Sheriff Lee Baca, there's reason to believe that, with adequate resources, the Los Angeles Police Department and the county Sheriff's Department could make our communities much safer.

They deserve that much. We deserve that much.

But experience offers no reason to believe that the political leadership of the city or the county share the commitment. Officials have had decades to provide the resources law enforcement needs, but they have chosen to squander the public wealth in ways that serve their own interests far better than the people's interests.

Even when the county recently came into a $309 million unexpected windfall, supervisors immediately promised to put it into employees' pockets - not for more deputies.

And now, the City Council is prepared to declare its commitment to come up with more money to hire an extra 1,740 officers. Members say the roughly $200 million this would cost can be found by getting rid of waste and inefficiency. We hope this is true, and we will keep a watchful eye on their progress.

But successive mayors and councils have made the same promise without doing what needs to be done.

The burden is on city and county officials to win back the people's trust instead of asking the public to pay one of the nation's highest sales tax rates - up one-half percent to 8.75 percent - to hire 1,260 more LAPD officers and 5,000 deputies and cops countywide.

Elected leaders cite the shortage of cops and claim that Measure A would bring in millions more for county and city police agencies. Then, in fear-mongering ads, they warn us that we'll be sorry if we don't approve it.

While everyone agrees on the need for more police, the cause for the shortage isn't a lack of funding. The city of Los Angeles has $160 million more to spend this year than last - exactly what the city would get from Measure A. Because there has been a lack of political will to provide for public safety over other priorities, not one cent went to hire more cops. In fact, there are fewer cops today than when Bratton came to town, despite Mayor James Hahn claiming his No. 1 priority is making L.A. safe again.

Time after time we have urged elected officials to meet taxpayers halfway, to economize, to prioritize, to free up money to match the taxes they seek to impose. So just days before the election, the council is moving forward in what we hope is more than lip service to public safety. The county also must show its intentions are honorable - and do something in a concrete way.

But in the past, officials haven't proved worthy of the public's trust. Until they do, they can't be trusted with even more of the public's money, despite the recent reassurances.

Our hope is the city and the county both demonstrate in strong and concrete ways that hiring more cops is their No. 1 priority and they take action that demonstrates as much. This means the politicians will have to stand up to special interests and say no to them and yes to more cops.

It's as simple as that.

If that were to happen, we think the public, in some upcoming election, would be much more willing to pass something like Measure A - to truly get all of the cops we need.

But until that happens, we feel we must oppose tax increases even for cops, much as we know they are needed. Otherwise, there will never be a reason for public officials to hold down spending and make tough decisions about setting priorities.

The Daily News recommends a no vote on Measure A.