In a long meeting on Tuesday that sailed past 3 o’clock in the morning, members of Santa Monica City Council voted unanimously 7-0 to prepare a resolution condemning the sign that was first placed on the front of 1335 Third Street by building owner John Alle in December 2022.
The sign itself has gone through a number of iterations since it first appeared and currently, it reads, "Santa Methica is not safe. SM City Manager supports free needle & meth pipe distribution program in our parks and public spaces." It hangs on a vacant building owned by John Alle at 1335 Third Street.
The item was raised by Mayor Phil Brock, Vice Mayor Lana Negrete and Councilmember Gleam Davis, who requested that Council direct the City Attorney Doug Sloane to "prepare a resolution for Council consideration that recites that, while the City of Santa Monica is respectful of everyone’s First Amendment rights to free speech, in some instances harm can come from expression that is false and/or counter to the public interest."
While conversation on this subject tends to spark an opinion in almost everyone, the Council’s discussion about Alle’s infamous sign was straightforward and without disagreement. Granted, the fact that the discussion took place at about 3am might have had something to do with that. What was much more interesting was the public comment both directly and indirectly connected with this topic.
Without a doubt, most of the public comment in this meeting on both non-agenda and agenda items, was related to public safety and the safety of residents, specifically regarding serious assaults and other crimes recently committed by members of the homeless community, which is in part, what this sign alludes to.
In the last six weeks alone, a homeless man dragged a woman across the beach path by her hair in a violent assault, a homeless suspect was charged with the attempted murder of German tourists, a tourist from Nevada had his car windshield smashed by homeless man as he exited the 10 freeway and a homeless man is being held on two charges of attempted murder following a multiple assault on the beach.
One resident, Trevor Nichols, explained how he’d been a paramedic for over 14 years. "I’ve ridden calls with Santa Monica Fire, Los Angeles County Fire, I’ve had a lot of hands on extensive experience with psychiatric, drug addled homeless people. And I’m going to tell you point blank, this is dangerous," Nichols said.
"We don’t have to look back far in our history to see what happens when you try to incorporate people with grave psychiatric disability, mix it with drugs and then let them run loose … A 17-year-old girl almost drowned. She almost lost her life yesterday if it wasn’t for the help of our police department and our lifeguards," Nichols said, adding, "We can’t allow gravely disabled psychiatric people that use drugs into our neighborhoods. It’s just gonna go nuts. It’s going to destroy [our community]."
However, an equal amount of contention was over the issue of first amendment free speech together with the fact that Alle has not presented any credible evidence that City Manager David White supports the free needle and meth pipe distribution program, which would equate to fear-mongering and disinformation.
Not to mention how much damage the sign does to the image and reputation of the city and in particular, the downtown and Promenade areas. To that end, Andrew Thomas, CEO of Downtown Santa Monica, Inc. (DTSM) offered comment to Council, along with DTSM board members Ericka Lesley, Barry Snell, Lucian Tudor and even Leo Pustilnikov.
Thomas explained that DTSM tracks all media mentions of downtown Santa Monica and this banner has generated "millions of negative media impressions for our city."
"It actively discourages people from visiting and conducting business downtown. It disparages our city manager and it advances false information. It’s beyond belief to think that this banner has not had an impact on our financial recovery. Certainly we have our share of concerns, however, a banner is not a solution to our problems," he said.
"If the purpose of the banner was to make a point then the owner should consider the point made and take down the banner for the good of the community. If the banners owner will not remove it, I strongly encourage the council to draft an ordinance enabling its removal," Thomas added.
John Alle himself also spoke, "The city council does have the authority to approve any harm reduction or needle distribution or glass pipe distribution in the city over the county. The mayor has not exercised that authority. There is no malice in the messaging on my building," he said.
Alle claimed to have copies of emails between White and County Health Director Barbara Ferrer. He also claimed to have photographs of both Brock and Negrete "handing out free drugs," something that they both vehemently denied as they responded by way of a Point of Personal Privilege, clarifying that they were observing the work that was being done in the parks. In fact, both were somewhat riled at the accusations and Alle exited the chamber immediately after making his statement.
Local resident John C. Smith, a four time Emmy Award-winning journalist, said, "You could say that I’m a pretty strong proponent of the First Amendment, but as a parks commissioner, I share the concerns of residents and business owners about public safety, homelessness and drug use in our city on the Promenade and in our parks," Smith said, adding, "However, this billboard is inaccurate. It’s not a city program. It’s the county doing it. Don’t blame David White for something someone else is doing. Blame the county."
When the item finally rolled around in the early hours of Wednesday morning, White read a prepared statement. "As city manager I’m committed to fully implementing policies adopted by the city council. The syringe exchange program is being implemented by a county contractor pursuant to state law. The city plays no role," he said.
"Council approved a letter in November 2022 and a resolution in April 2024 opposing the implementation of the program in its current form, primarily because of the locations the county chose to operate near parks and schools. So it is not accurate to say the city manager supports the program in contradiction with council direction," White added.
City Attorney Doug Sloane added, "This is not censorship. This is not regulatory. The city is not mandating that anything happened. This is government speech, what’s being proposed. The council’s entitled to state its opinion too under the First Amendment. So that’s all this is."
Davis shared a similar sentiment, "I would never support something that censored anyone within the city even if I found the statements to be distasteful. But that is not what this proposed resolution does. What it simply does is express the consensus, if it’s passed, of the council, that we too have a right to free speech and that our speech would be that the sign misleads … folks as to who was responsible for running the Harm Reduction Program," she said, adding, "But if we pass this resolution, there will be no compulsion or no regulation of speech."
The motion was moved by Gleam, seconded by Brock and in a recently-rare moment of bipartisan, unified opinion, passed 7-0.
