There’s a lot going on in this town and it’s nearly impossible to track every decision made within the walls of City Hall.
Merchants along Second and Fourth streets earlier this month realized how true that is when they saw urban planners marking dozens of trees to be chopped down, a decision made by the City Council last fall as part of a plan that has been in the works for the better part of nine years.
In efforts to provide more light and open space to what have been described as “dark streets,” the plan calls for a total of 54 ficus trees to be cut down — 29 on Fourth Street and 25 on Second Street. Eighty ficus trees will remain. In the mature trees’ stead, 116 smaller, leafier trees — called ginkos — will be planted.
Dozens of merchants are outraged that City Hall’s solution to make the shopping corridors a block off of the Promenade more pedestrian friendly is to cut down perfectly good trees. On the surface, it doesn’t seem the most environmentally friendly solution in a self-described “green city.”
The project is estimated to cost $3.5 million. Since 2003, a combination of grant funds have trickled in to support the plan, including $2.2 million from the federal government and $1 million from the state, and City Hall has already allocated $280,000 from its general fund. However, City Hall still needs to raise $1 million to complete the project it wants, according to city staff.
There is something askew in the fact that there is money available to cut down perfectly healthy trees just because they have matured and replacing them with smaller ones more aesthetically pleasing. That money could be better spent on countless other important matters like education, or feeding the hungry.
Business owners have submitted a petition to City Hall, asking the City Council to reconsider its decision and save the trees, some of which are 75 years old — an unlikely scenario since City Hall spent $39,000 to pay an urban design firm to come up with the plan. It would cost thousands of dollars more to change it at this point.
City officials say if merchants had an opinion on the issue they should have come to the public meetings when the concept was discussed. We agree. People can’t make an impact if they don’t involve themselves in political and public processes. That’s a right every American is entitled to, and most of the time they choose not to engage themselves.
And that is not to say that even if the merchants had voiced their opinions they would have been heard. Oftentimes, elected officials go through the motions of listening to public comment but do what they want anyway.
A business official commented this week during a meeting about the future of downtown Santa Monica that Second and Fourth streets lack sufficient retail businesses. It’s not surprising since those areas have been ignored for years — until recently.
Those streets — and the businesses on them — have been treated by City Hall as the step-children to the economic engine that has become the Third Street Promenade. There is not one merchant from Second or Fourth streets that sits on the Bayside District Corp. Board of Directors, which manages the downtown area in conjunction with City Hall.
The City Council, which appoints the Bayside Board members, needs to bring people who do business on Second and Fourth streets into the process. And those merchants need to engage themselves, pay attention to what is going on around them and follow what their appointed and elected officials are doing. Otherwise, they will never be able to control their destinies.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 24, 2006. Read the original PDF.