BY BILL BAUER Majority ranks pretty low on depth chart
Santa Monicans took it in the shorts at the last City Council meeting. After frittering away another $3.3 million on social service programs, politicians stuck it to the rest of us by requesting a garbage rate increase of 7 percent effective July 1. That’s on top of a 10 percent increase last year.
The City Council started off by “giving” $3,010,789 to Community Corp. of Santa Monica (CCSM) to buy and rehab an eight-unit apartment building at 1944 20th St. CCSM is a City Hall-controlled nonprofit corporation that does the lion’s share of the town’s affordable housing.
CCSM plans to move tenants and pay for hotels while it renovates the apartments. Then, the tenants can move back in at reduced rents. The project doesn’t even add new housing stock.
I wish City Hall would buy the building I live in. I’d be thrilled if it spent $50,000 in renovations and reduced my rent. How sweet is that? Would their gift to me provide any public benefit? I think not.
City Hall, through CCSM, has hundreds of units of new affordable housing under construction all over town. But in this case, eight existing families score big time while the rest of us pay higher fees for basic services. And, because deep-pocketed City Hall is willing and able to pay top dollar for anything in sight, rent-controlled tenants with fixed or limited incomes in older apartment buildings are placed in even more jeopardy by soaring real estate prices, which attract more developers and speculators.
We can blame Councilmembers Kevin McKeown, Pam O’Connor, Richard Bloom, Ken Genser and Mayor Bob Holbrook for voting for this giveaway, as well as the garbage fee increase. And, for another $315,000 for “homeless” expenditures which Councilman Bobby Shriver also supported.
City Hall awarded $126,000 to Urban Institute to study the effectiveness of homeless service programs in its “Continuum of Care.” Referred to as “continuum of misery” by transients, it’s predicated on the wishful thinking that all persons really want to get off the street and become productive members of society.
City Hall has spent more than $40 million directly on the “continuum of care” over the last 20 years. Starting with drop-in facilities where individuals access temporary assistance, the “continuum” encourages — but doesn’t require — clients to move on to counseling, temporary shelters, job training, transitional and permanent housing and employment.
A Daily Press editorial (April 28, page 4) noted that homeless service has become a major local industry, providing income for hundreds of employees and political clout. Unfortunately, it also is a magnet that attracts vagrants and transients — now up to an estimated 2,000 per night (Daily Press, March 20, page 4) — keeps them here and dependent.
City Hall is obsessed with affordable housing and homeless services. Santa Monica has become one big welfare state. In the meantime, the rest of us pay extra for basics such as schools, garbage and water. Our kids pay high fees to use the skatepark and our branch libraries stay dark and locked on Fridays and Sundays.
Maybe you like paying higher taxes and getting less for your tax dollars while idealistic city leaders pursue pie-in-the sky social engineering. I don’t. (Bill Bauer has lived in the same Santa Monica apartment for 35 years.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 8, 2006. Read the original PDF.