By Kevin Ueda
Special to the Daily Press

WILSHIRE BOULEVARD — Taking into account his nearly seven decades of business experience, the local chamber of commerce has tapped John Bohn to be its next top community representative.

The Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce on Thursday night installed Bohn as its new chairman of the board at the 81st annual installment dinner the Fairmont Miramar Hotel. The one-year seat was held previously by local jeweler Eddie Guerboian.

Bohn said he wants to fix traffic and homelessness problems, expedite slow upstarts for business owners due to local government bureaucracy, and improve relations between the chamber and City Hall.

He has been involved with the chamber for 50 years and has been a resident of Santa Monica since 1936. He has four boys, ranging in age from 42 to 55 years old.

Originally from Centralia, Ill., Bohn, 85, is a Southern Californian at heart.

“Santa Monica has always had exciting things happening and it would be hard for me to say that there was any particular time that was any more exciting (than now),” Bohn said. “There’s always something going on.”

Bohn owned his first business in town when he was 16. Today, the Bohn family now owns and has limited shares in several property-management businesses, including Bohn Bros. Mouitrie, Inc., and Parr-Bohn Properties. The chairman also has worked with several non-profit organizations, such as the Westminster Towers.

The Daily Press recently sat down with Bohn to discuss life in Santa Monica and his role at the chamber.

What do you like about living in Santa Monica?

“Well, I like living in Santa Monica because of the climate, because of the wonderful people who also live here; because of the educational opportunities; it has been very kind to me as far as my businesses are concerned. My first business in Santa Monica was when I was 16 years old. I operated a Christmas tree lot on the southwest corner of Third and Wilshire for several years. When they built JC Penny’s, I couldn’t rent the lot anymore because there was a building going in.”

What don’t you like about Santa Monica?

“I have some concerns about traffic. I’m concerned about homeless problems and I’m concerned that sometimes city services seem less responsive than they should. For example, opening a new business or trying to build or remodel something, It often takes a long time to get approvals for relatively minor building changes. I’m talking on a comparative basis of the amount of time it takes other cities.”

How has the city changed over the years since you’ve been here?

“Let me give you something that’s very personal that could indicate the change: I was on the City Council, on and off, from 1960 to 1965. When we used to have council meets in those days, the meetings were over often at 9:30 p.m. I would never be able today to serve the hours that are demanded by being a city councilman.”

How do you feel about the community today?

“I think there’s been a big change in the number of apartments that’s been built over the years. We’re now kind of an apartment community — there’s mostly apartment dwellers. That’s a change that’s occurred since I eventually came here. More people rent apartments than own homes.

Why is that?

“I think that part of that is the result of faulty planning that years ago, maybe we zoned too much land for multiple housing.”

What would you change about Santa Monica?

“Well, if I could change anything, the most important thing I’d try to do — and I am trying to help to — would be eradicate the homeless (problem). I think that it’s one of the things that detracts from our city and needs to be changed. If you walk on the Promenade or you’re a visitor from abroad and you’re walking downtown, it’s highly likely that you’ll be panhandled, which is a surprise to a lot of foreign visitors that come here. This used to be a manufacturing city. Douglas Aircraft, at one time, employed as many as 30,000 people here and there were a lot of industrial buildings at that time leased to firms that were supporters of the aircraft Industry. That industry now has changed. Douglas is now gone. Most of these Industrial buildings are now being leased to entertainment-industry related businesses.”

What do you hope to accomplish on the Chamber of Commerce? What are some issues and priorities you have during this election year?

“One of the things we have is we want to encourage more people to be active in city government. Particularly some of our bright young people, we’d like to see develop their leadership abilities and so forth. We have, for example, we have had recently a city clerk come in and speak. Mayor Bob Holbrook and Councilman Herb Katz came and described the problems they saw as far as running for election is concerned. The idea was to try and get people who might be interested in running for elected office in Santa Monica to better understand the process, the pitfalls and what they’d have to go through. This, by the way, is open to everybody. We have no political agenda for these candidates presentations. Right, left, or middle is all welcome to come and listen to the people who will tell them what their experiences have been and what the laws are concerning running for election in Santa Monica.”

What will your job entail?

“Along with the board of directors, we’ll administer the chamber. We will discuss issues the chamber feels are important to businesses In Santa Monica. One way you could succinctly put it, as far as the chamber is considered, we try to do what we can to assist the businesses. We represent them with the city government, we put on Taste of Santa Monica, we have business expos, we have the health fair; these are things that are sponsored by the chamber.”

You said that the chamber will be working with City Hall. Don’t the two entities usually butt heads?

“Oh, of course. We’ve had a lot of disagreement In the past on various issues. Parking, for example; the chamber Is concerned about the homeless situation because we get so many complaints from our members. We believe we’re very pleased so far with the new city manager. We have found him so far to be very open, communicative, willing to listen and that’s important to us. Apparently, he’s involved in some programs that we believe may help improve the homeless situation.”

What are some issues that are important to businesses?

“One of them always is adequate parking for the businesses. Second one is the service that City Hall, which I mentioned from various departments there, we have those concerns. We’re concerned about traffic problems.”

How tough is it to run a business in Santa Monica?

“It’s often not easy today to start a business in Santa Monica. First of all, you have to find space. Rents are high; but given that, and the process of getting a business license, doing the things that you need to do to get your business open often take a painful amount of time in working with various city departments involved.”

What did you like about Eddie Guerboian’s leadership in the past year at the chamber?

“I like the fact that Eddie has related well to some of the problems (for businesses). As a longtime retailer in Santa Monica, he has an understanding of business problems and some of the things than need to be done, he’s emphasized those during his administration. I plan to continue those. I’d also like to see if we can raise the funds to employ another person at the chamber who would be a government affairs person. I would expect that person to relate closely, spend more time working with the city and with the businesses that have had problems with the city, in the hopes that this would forestall some conflicts before they get out of control or arise.”

Where do you live in Santa Monica? Where else have you lived?

“I live on 18th Street. We’ve lived here 35 years. I’ve lived on Berkeley Street. I’ve lived on Chelsea Street. When I lived on Berkeley, I was in high school and college.”

Where did you move from?

“Born In Centralia, Ill. My father passed away and my mother decided to move out here with my brother, myself, and my grandmother because tuition at UCLA was much cheaper than the University of Illinois. At that time, seems to me, tuition at UCLA was only about $16 or $17 a semester. Try that today.”

What did you major in at UCLA?

“At the time I graduated from Santa Monica High School, I had wanted to go to Cal Tech and I was admitted, but my parents could not afford to send me there. However, I went to UCLA. Graduated in ’49. I majored In business-related things; accounting, history. To help work my way through school at UCLA, I sold corsages and cut flowers for sorority houses and fraternity houses and members of sorority houses and fraternities at UCLA. I did It for money. I enjoyed It, it was fun to go down to the floral market.”

What’s your philosophy on life?

“I don’t know I would encapsulate that in a few words. I’m somewhat of a pragmatist. I try to always be optimistic. I’m very proud of my family and I enjoy my relationship with church.”

Where are your favorite places to go In Santa Monica?

“I like going to Fromin’s Restaurant ... I like walking up and down Montana Avenue, which Is near my home; going to the 17th Street Café; going to the motion picture theaters on the Promenade.”