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# A story about the landmarks process
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/a-story-about-the-landmarks-process-editor/
- Published: 2003-02-20T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T01:38:26.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Opinion, Ocean Park, #archive-import, Homeless

*By S. Forest King Santa Monica*

The controversy over historic landmarks is one that exemplifies the mutated political system within our community. As with most political movements in Santa Monica, activists who are jobless or dependent upon the system thrive on telling the rest of us what to do with our hard-earned businesses and possessions.

As the owner of a property subjected to the sharp stick of this macabre institution, I can tell you a story seldom retold without mistruths by those who wish to perpetuate the injustice. My property at 2712 Second Street had a dilapidated 350 square foot shack — not much larger than a contemporary living room. Its structural beams were so rotten that I could crush them with my bare hand. The walls were thin “board and batten” shallow planks, you could see through the gaps between them.

Unfortunately for me, the building was desired as a “meeting place” by a self-anointed neighborhood group, the Ocean Park Community Organization (OPCO), preferably with the land included. In consort with city staff, OPCO used historic landmark’s to put us through three years of misery. As an architect, I was astonished that such a dysfunctional structure would be considered of merit. Others agreed and in the first landmarks meeting I had enough votes on my side to demolish the structure. The gavel hit the table and it was over until a former city staff member, Donna Jerex, spoke out after the vote and persuaded a commissioner (who resigned soon after) to change his vote “so they would have a couple of weeks to find somebody to give the building to.”

We offered to sign a written agreement giving them the time, but it was not enough. After waiting for over two months for a response I became slightly concerned. I soon found out that during this period a series of mailers and letters were being sent out to the community by city staff in order to garner support for the preservation of this structure as it sat. I live in the neighborhood and received them myself. Susan Love- Loughmiller and Rick Laudati of OPCO decided the cause would be a good way to reinvigorate their eroding group.

During the three years that followed, I was repeatedly told by city staff and elected officials that if I performed certain requests I would be able to demolish the neighborhood eyesore. At one council meeting I was explicitly told I could remove it if I presented them with a photo documentary of the building, which I did, yet both OPCO and the Church in Ocean Park appealed, making my presentation mute. Another time I was told that if I made a good faith effort to find donated land within the local area for its relocation, I would be relieved of this burden. I did so, but the rules again changed at the last minute. This was happening in spite of adjacent neighbors to the property wishing for the structure to be removed, since it was an eyesore and “attractive nuisance” to area homeless.

Most heart wrenching were not the three years of sleepless nights and over $200,000 in expenses, nor the discovery of the extreme dishonesty in our twisted city government. My most important loss was the goodwill with the banks and investors that I had established after 20 years of being an honest and reliable architect/contractor. Banks do not care what reasons you give for breaking a time schedule, even when you make all the payments. Though this was to be a home for myself, my ability to finance projects has been eliminated.

After three years we were allowed demolition, and only then could we sell the property. OPCO finally convinced somebody with $10,000 to waste to move it minutes before the wrecking ball arrived. It is now being stored at the city airport at taxpayer expense until the OPCO understands it cannot be renovated to today’s codes without ending up only a replica of the structure. It will cost over $1,000 per square foot including even the cheapest land in the city. Ironic when I think of the fact that I offered to move the building for them for free when it started.

What happened to me has only happened to a few people, but it can happen to anybody. It can also ruin your life. We have an elected council that encourages special interests to use government to harm people under the guise of community concerns. Proponents of forced Historic Landmarks do not want people to have a choice so they may selectively target us one by one — we are defenseless this way. Recently Santa Monica adopted the National Standards to determine merit. However they neglected to include the most important aspect; the National Standards for Historic Landmarks requires an owner’s consent.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 20, 2003.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/022003.pdf?ref=smdp.com)