Again?
Still.
How do you like the artist’s rendering of Santa Monica’s newest skyscraper, a low rise 24 stories coming to 6th and Colorado. When? Never is too soon for me.
And that’s the crux of it, isn’t it? The fights and division here, over how the future of our city should look. A lot of it depends on how you feel about development. I started as common sense, slow-growth for my city. It’s not a good plan for any community to stay stuck in the past; some managed growth is good. Then as I saw how much was being built here, accompanied by ill effects, I decided it was time for a moratorium on new construction. I said years ago we needed to take a pause, but that didn’t happen, and it has only exploded since.
But that’s unreasonable, stuck in the past, nostalgic, blah blah blah. You know what’s unreasonable? That building at the top of this column. In Santa Monica. It is insane. My typing the words "Santa Monica’s newest skyscraper," should be beyond belief. Yet here we are. Fighting about development, how much, how big, how tall, where, how many "affordable" units? When what we need to do is take a step back, clear our heads and ask, are you crazy? Who benefits from this? Not the residents. Then, who?
Saved the pier, started rent control
Santa Monicans did that in the early ‘70s, when developers planned to put up a string of high rises on the beach, starting with the two we’ve got and stretching up past the Pier. They also put forward a plan to tear down the Pier, build an island in our bay with high rise resort hotels and bridges leading to LAX and to Malibu. The City Council liked it and approved it, but 1,000 residents showed up to a Council meeting and they had to back down. And their political careers were over. The residents won because they got organized. Today a lot of residents feel the same way about many issuers but they complain in small, ineffective groups. No organization, no money, no candidates. If nothing changes, at this late date, we’re screwed.
The $$$ is bigger now, and the BS is deeper. Oh, and there are several more ridiculously tall (for SM) coming, approved, up to 18 stories (two of those). If you had been asleep for 20 years and awakened to this reality, once you were convinced it was not a nightmare, your head would explode. Doesn’t make any sense. Someone tell me why this has happened.
There have been plenty who have backed this, and enabled it, even City Council members and mayors, and if forced to they might take a whack at defending it. But even the guy asleep for 20 years could smell the BS, and be able to refute any rationale. Because — it is
Indefensible
Are there half a million distraught souls lining the borders of our 8.4 square miles, wailing, "We have nowhere else to go! You must let us in! And have homes for us!" Are those who don’t live here yet more important than those who do? We seem to be operating that way, building a city and services for our beloved future residents. Whoever they may be.
The notion that building will help ease our affordability crisis, or even the mythical housing crisis, is probably nonsense. And it sure won’t get those off the street who need services, not just a million dollar tiny condo.
You can say this is a difference of political opinion, but I say no. There are no good reasons for all this overdevelopment in Santa Monica, and so we have to conclude that it is storytelling to hide agendas that have nothing to do with SM residents. We have to quit arguing about the details and simply say, this is insane.
We should be asking that who benefits? question more, and not shrugging our shoulders to inevitability. A Santa Monica filling up with skyscrapers and rows and rows of huge block buildings? With no design aesthetics, open space, or even parking?? Is that normal? Is that right, for SM? Greedy would-be autocrats at all levels use that playbook, to throw out so much nonsense and outright crap that we get used to it. It becomes normalized. And then the next one won’t seem so bad, not worth speaking out against because, well, it’s just one more.
But we absolutely do need to speak up, about the emperor’s new clothes. They are not only ugly, they are toxic, replacing and destroying what was good. Santa Monica was never a paradise, without blemish, but there was/is a lot that is good and worth saving. History, culture, leaders in politics, sports, the spiritual and other fields, ethnicities, celebrities, artists, accomplishments, a worldwide reputation and recognition. The movies, Hollywood, was born on our beach. SM has always punched way above its weight in so many areas.
Not good enough anymore?
Do we need high rises and no cars at all and a population of half a million? Maybe the developers who are helping create our current woes of crime, addiction, unattended mental health problems, corruption in government don’t care. No one measures the value of a community by its shiny new buildings.
So speak up, please, to save what’s left of this beautiful coastal city, but – don’t get lost in the weeds. Yes, the beastly apartment complex that will rise where the Gelson’s lot is, Lincoln and Ocean Park, bypassed or violated several guardrails in its determination to be developed in a certain way. (Large as possible, right out to the curb.) And made a mockery of "community input." The behemoth building taking over the Vons further up Lincoln is also unneeded at that huge size, and a blight on the neighborhood. Part of the emerging Great Wall of Lincoln.
So be outraged if you love this city, speak up, but don’t lose focus. As on our national political scene, what’s really important is voting. I know, cities and their governing Councils have been stripped by Sacramento of the ability to determine their own futures, in many regards. But this selling out the city began a long time ago, and Gleam Davis has been on City Council for 15 years, she has always been pro-development, and was joined last election by two more pro-development Council members, Jesse Zwick and Caroline Torosis. That makes for a divided Council, with The Slate of Phil Brock, Oscar de la Torre and Christine Parra mostly voting "slow growth," but not always having the vote of independent Lana Negrete to tip the balance.
But imagine if it becomes 5-2 or even 6-1. We’re screwed.
It’s late, but not too late.
Charles Andrews has lived in Santa Monica for 38 years and wouldn’t live anywhere else.
