By Marilyn Brennan Santa Monica
Thank you for printing Christian Boyce’s terrific letter and for Bill Bauer’s “My write” (SMDP, Oct. 24, page 4), both addressed the City Council’s lack of accountability and sustainability in a courageous and insightful way.
I recently saw an City Confidential on A &E featuring a crime that took place in Santa Monica. In the documentary, Santa Monica was described as a quaint, quiet, laid-back, slow, gentle city by the ocean. I burst out laughing. When had the researchers for the documentary last been here? In 1976 maybe. Certainly not in the last three or four years.
The City Council and/or city planning department really do not seem to get it. On many levels and many issues, from the homeless situation so beautifully covered by Bill Bauer, to cutting down palm trees for no discernible reason, to pouring more and more traffic into the already crazy traffic mix.
Either the City Council doesn’t realize or doesn’t care that Santa Monicans are tired of the blinders used in most of the decision making for the city. Like the impact of the artificial turf Christian Boyce describes, there doesn’t seem to be a person on the City Council who has the foresight or knowledge to think these things through. This lack of foresight in ridiculous. For instance, housing. Yes, Santa Monica needs affordable housing — but think this through: Putting up one 50-unit building will throw from 50 to 100 more cars into the traffic/parking mix. Then multiply that by all the apartment/condos the city continues to allow to go up and you are throwing more and more cars into an already bulging-at-the-seams traffic and parking situation. On top of this, they are planning medians, congesting traffic even more.
Can we connect the dots and realize that more apartment buildings mean more cars? That allowing more and more apartment buildings to shoot up all over Santa Monica is throwing way too many cars and SUVs into the already present driving and parking nightmare? The city nixed the proposal for a Target going up in the downtown area because they felt the traffic would be adversely affected. Duh. But I guess they feel that all the apartments and condos they allow don’t adversely affect the traffic flow. Wake up and smell the exhaust. When the alleys and parking garages are lighted better than the city sidewalks, we all know we live in a place and time where cars are king, and where one’s self approval rating depends not on personal accomplishments but, sadly, on the kind of vehicle we drive.
The City Council reminds me of the soldiers Sitting Bull dreamed about just before the battle of Little Big Horn. The dream depicted soldiers falling into his camp — and they had no ears. This was a true vision. Many scouts and people who knew what they were talking about tried to warn Custer again and again, but he, like many politicians we know, had no ears to hear the truth. So it is with the City Council. Do they not get how upset people in Santa Monica have become? Or do they just not care? Either way, it’s time for a change. And while I don’t believe any of them will suffer Custer’s fate — I do believe that the City Council will definitely have ears to hear us loud and clear on election day.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 29, 2003. Read the original PDF.