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# Blind support of Prop V is just plain lazy
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/blind-support-of-prop-v-is-just-plain-lazy-editor/
- Published: 2006-10-19T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T21:42:25.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Opinion, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*By Don Gray BaySmart.org*

Letter writer Genise Schnitman has it all wrong. To consider Proposition V to be above criticism due to our city’s stellar environmental history is akin to not criticizing our involvement in Iraq because the U.S. has always done such a great job with the concept of democracy; it’s the mindset of a lazy, and ultimately, vulnerable citizenry.

First, the city hires an outside contractor to develop a stormwater plan with virtually no opportunity for public comment — let alone any resident direction. The result has so many shortcomings that, in this day and age, its failures can only be considered to be intentional. Our City Council hastily approves the plan, and almost simultaneously places a tax with a misleading name on the ballot to fund it — and any other project that might fit the incredibly broad parameters. They then get a spokesperson to conveniently forget his previous public criticisms of it, and count on their environmental reputation to sell a defective measure to the voters.

Bill Bauer should be commended, not criticized, for his bravery in pointing out that, in the case of Prop. V, the emperor indeed has no clothes. As voters, we get an opportunity to express our opinion of Prop.V — something that has previously been denied us — by rejecting it. Only then can we hope to develop a program that actually cleans up our Bay.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 19, 2006.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/101906.pdf?ref=smdp.com)