Editor:
It’s upsetting to see our City Council pushing ahead commercial development while cutting the community out of the approval process. I refer to the outrageous violation of the public trust that occurred on May 14 at [the] City Council [meeting] when the pro-development majority approved a project on Second Street in Downtown that violates the code requirements for open space and parking.
[Councilmembers Bob] Holbrook, [Pam] O’Connor, [Terry] O’Day and [Gleam] Davis all [approved] the proposal, even after [Councilman Ted] Winterer pointed out that the vote should be delayed because the proposal they were voting on came to council after the hearing had begun, which means there was no possibility for the public to read the proposal or comment on it. Voters should send a message to council to not approve this project on second reading on June 11 because second readings do not allow for public comment. Tell the City Council we want it to send a message to developers that such 11th-hour trickery will not be tolerated in the future.
Tricia Crane
Santa Monica
I do agree with others that the city has gone haywire in its mindless frenzy for development.
But I do agree with Gary Kavanagh that this project on second and Arizona is a thoughtful and wise step for the city.
Currently the development at this location is a bit of an eye sore. Yes, the proposed development design is just another run of the mill modernist hodgepodge. But it does outshine others in its employee sensitivity, some minimal subterranean parking, and bike-friendliness (racks and space), not to mention its LEED gold construction! That is a great nod from our city to environmental consciousness. But, really, in this day and age, shouldn’t the city require LEED design of all new construction?
And kudos to the developers for all those solar panels. They deserve credit for this. But, wait, there’s only enough solar panels to support half the common areas? Really? That’s gotta the city’s epitome of pandering tokenism. The Council could at least require the solars panels to able to provide half the total of electricity consumed in the entire building. We are after all a city at the forefront of awareness; we know about climate change, we know the cost of electricity, or do we? And we certainly we have the resource: lots of sunlight.
I also congratulate the city for all the concessions it got from the developers: a quarter million here, a quarter million there. I only wonder, who knows where the money goes? Certainly this should not be just another way for the city to fill it’s coffers. If so, we really have sold our soul.
Taking a quick look at what is actually posted online by the city for this agenda item and the developer proposal I feel like this letter is extremely misleading by saying this is “pushing commercial” and suggesting it is deficient of parking requirements. The project is almost entirely housing with ground floor retail that is replacing the retail use that already exists at the site.
http://www.smgov.net/departments/council/agendas/2013/20130514/s2013051407-A.htm
The scale and housing predominant make up of this project did not require a full float up or CEQA process under the interim zoning ordinance for the downtown area. It’s proposed as a 4 story 53 unit building with 66 underground parking spaces, and by right they could do fewer parking spaces by paying into the parking district. There is no mandate within the downtown that developments provide onsite parking. Personally I would have preferred fewer parking spaces on site given the proximity to nearly every present and proposed transit route in Santa Monica.
There is very a small addition of height in this building to the one exactly the same number of stories next to it because the ground floor is taller than in the old codes, which is something called for in the LUCE and has been discussed a number of time in response to the stunted retail spaces of apartments with mixed use commercial on the ground done under the old code.
The proposed site itself is short on open space but is proposing $350,000 toward downtown area open space improvements, and speaking in my own opinion, within a specifically downtown context (such as this site is), open space is best done through public investment in surrounding fully public spaces, not trying to squeeze in on site quasi spaces in every constrained property.
I don’t see anything particularly controversial about this project at all.
We should not tolerate it NOW! Recall the fast Development Four: Holbrook, O’Connor, O’Day, Davis!
What they are doing is plain simple against the law!
We the people of Santa Monica have lost control of our City to developers who have limitless money they need to use.
These build-it-quick-and-sell-it-fast developers are using the name and location of Santa Monica to market their totally unsuitable projects.
Santa Monica’s ‘beach community’ infrastructure CANNOT support this amount of development.
We all know about the traffic gridlock and parking problems.
But consider the massive additional amounts of sewage disposal and electricity needed by these projects, for which there is no provision.
Where I live on Ocean Avenue north of Montana Avenue, we already do not have an adequate or reliable supply of electricity.
Our fragile cliff cannot support the massive structures being planned.
As a 47-year resident on north Ocean Avenue, I have watched the Palisades Park retreating towards me as it progressively slides down onto PCH.
A fault line runs through Santa Monica which did the extensive damage in a bulls-eye going out from Ocean Avenue and Montana Avenue, in the ‘Northridge’ quake.
On Ocean Avenue we have examples of the on-going problems the built-it-and-run developers left others to deal with.
In addition to everything else, the City Council is considering the recommendation of a development consultant group to put a 300 room hotel, 480 condos and two acres of commercial structures where the Civic Center parking lot is now, beside the Civic Auditorium, which is scheduled to be ‘mothballed’ in June.
The consultants’ development proposal can be read at:
http://www.saveourcivicauditorium.org/PresentationWebRes.jpg