Editor:
The purpose of a new zoning ordinance and amendments to the City's General Plan (LUCE) is to provide for a more orderly and better functioning community by making rules that govern the kinds of development that are allowed.
Zoning ordinance revisions recently approved by the Planning Commission and a proposed LUCE amendment fail this basic criterion and should be rejected by the City Council. The poster child for this failure would be the rezoning of a 2-acre area in Wilmont at 18th and Wilshire. The rezoning essentially relocates the discredited 14th Street Activity Center and its community damaging horrors to 18th Street.
Recommendations to the draft zoning ordinance and revisions to the LUCE that were researched and proposed by our City's engaged neighborhood organizations seem to have been largely ignored by city staff and the Planning Commission.
As a former Planning Commissioner in other California jurisdictions, I find it particularly disturbing to see knowledgeable public input finessed and camouflaged by City officials in apparent deference to development special interests. Santa Monica can do much better than that.
Dan O'Grady
Santa Monica
