> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.smdp.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Trying to cut down commute - URL: https://www.smdp.com/trying-to-cut-down-commute/ - Published: 2007-03-13T15:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-24T00:14:01.000Z - Author: Kevin Herrera - Tags: Government & Politics, Venice, #archive-import *Living locally can help reduce stress, improve productivity* CITYWIDE While he lives only 20 miles from his office at City Hall, Deputy City Attorney Ivan Campbell spends about two hours of his day in his car commuting, and that’s only if he leaves before or after rush hour. If he decides to follow the rest of the herd, it can take even longer. That’s because Campbell lives in Carson — not by choice, but out of necessity. Even though he has a steady, well-paying job with benefits, Campbell can’t seem to break into the high-priced housing market in Santa Monica. “I considered staying close, but I couldn’t afford it,” said Campbell, who rented in Venice before moving south for more affordable housing. “It’s too expensive to own if you’re single out in the Los Angeles area and Santa Monica even more so.” Campbell hopes to move closer to Santa Monica, probably within the next three to five years, but if there was some kind of incentive offered by City Hall, he would be able to relocate sooner, he said. “There’s a huge need for affordable housing, some sort of city-subsidized housing,” Campbell said. “I know the city offers incentives for ridesharing, but I don’t know if there are any incentives to actually live here. “There’s a huge workforce here and for about 95 percent of them, living here is impossible.” City Manager Lamont Ewell is looking to change that. The Santa Monica resident has formed a workforce housing committee comprised of community leaders, high-ranking executives in the private and public sector and a major contractor to develop solutions to a crisis that is affecting not just Santa Monica, but many cities where young professionals making a livable wage are still priced-out. “About 80 percent of employees in the city are commuting back and forth to work, and then we wonder why we are having such challenges with traffic and our local streets being so congested,” Ewell said. “That’s what prompted me to form this committee. I’m hoping we can come together and start thinking about how we can tackle this.” Forming the committee is not another case of city government trying to solve society’s problems, but rather an attempt to facilitate a community-wide discussion that includes all players, Ewell said. “I’d be a fool to think I have all the answers,” he said.“This is about the community coming together to solve this problem. Now there may be properties that are owned by the city, by (Santa Monica College) or others where we could take a look at opportunities.We just have to look at every single approach.” One doesn’t have to look very far to find the impacts of a transient workforce. Residents can step outside their homes and look at the line of cars stacked along Pico, Olympic, Santa Monica and Wilshire boulevards as workers make their daily, evening migration to the east. Employers only have to take a glance at their employees’ time cards to see those who continually arrive late to work are stressed-out because of a congested freeway. And those who rely on new recruits can only sit back and watch as highly-qualified candidates take jobs elsewhere because of the high cost of housing. “Housing is a huge challenge for us,” said Posie Carpenter, chief administrative officer for Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center, which, along with St. John’s Health Center, has only 8.8 percent of its employees living in Santa Monica. Not only do physicians need to live nearby, so do other employees in order for the hospital to provide the best medical care possible. Some treatments require quicker response times from doctors. Where someone lives can literally mean the difference between life or death, Carpenter said. From a recruitment perspective, many in the medical field and beyond do not want to fight traffic, which makes it difficult for facilities like Santa Monica-UCLA to attract the best of the best. That goes for SMC as well. “There is a lot to be said about having our faculty and staff living here,” said Chui Tsang, president of SMC. “This is where we can really build a stronger community feeling to the college. We are supposed to serve the community and we know that when we have faculty members and staff members who live near the college, we see a greater attachment to the college and to the services that are provided here.” The benefits of living in the same city where one works are enormous, said Matt Woods, an assistant at a downtown law firm who lives in Ocean Park. It only takes him five minutes to drive home, saving him plenty of time to make lunch, check the mail and watch some afternoon television before heading back to the office. “It’s a nice place to live in,” Woods said of Santa Monica.“I live close to the promenade and Main Street and the beach, and that convenience is very cool.” While it is expensive,Woods is able to afford his apartment because of rent control, he said. Believe it or not, there are those who don’t mind the commute and actually prefer to live outside of Santa Monica because of the city’s politics and semi-secluded location. Jay Sarmenta is one of them. A resident of Sherman Oaks, Sarmenta said his 40-minute commute to his job at an investment firm on Ocean Avenue has become “part of life,” and doesn’t mind the drive “as long as it’s not over an hour.” “Each person has their own agenda,” he said. “It’s just a matter of preference … I’d only move here if I lived in Brentwood or somewhere north of Wilshire.” The committee will hold its first meeting Monday, April 19 at the Main Library. The public is encouraged to attend, Ewell said. Some ideas that will be considered include offering low-cost loans to city employees, including fire fighters and police officers, as well as educators. “We need to look at directing some of the affordable housing toward people who are vital to our infrastructure,” Carpenter said, “and our security.” *Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on March 13, 2007.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/031307.pdf?ref=smdp.com)