The Ground Floor Gallery and event space on 1217 Second Street in Santa Monica, a room filled with civic leaders, entrepreneurs, developers, and innovators gathered on Wednesday to tackle a question increasingly shaping the future of DTSM and our city.
California Affordable Lodging Solutions (CALS), a nonprofit focused on bridging the public and private sectors around affordable hospitality and economic development, co-hosted the second installment of its Downtown Leadership Forum series with the City of Santa Monica. Opened by Mayor Caroline Torosis, the forum brought together placemaking experts, elected officials, capital markets leaders, creative entrepreneurs, and technology founders to discuss how the city can restore momentum to its downtown core while positioning itself for the next generation of industries.
The forum featured two panels. The first, “What Brings People Back,” moderated by Doug Higgins of CALS, focused on placemaking and the broader vision for Downtown Santa Monica. Panelists included Peter Fisher, co-founder and chief creative officer of Metropolis, Santa Monica Councilmember Barry Snell, Christian Irwin, senior vice president of leasing at Prism Places, and Craig Lewis, director of placemaking at Arcadis.
The second panel, “What Actually Changes Downtown: Deals, Capital and Execution,” moderated by Andrew Swerdloff of CALS, featured Scott Painter, founder and CEO of Autonomy and TrueCar, Corvas Brinkerhoff, CEO of Submersive and co-founder of Meow Wolf, Jason Chouluchas, managing director at Bank OZK, Rohit Shukla, founder and CEO of the Larta Institute, and Jake Zacuto, managing director of the Zacuto Group.
Mayor Torosis opened the forum by noting that the city is moving in the right direction on its downtown realignment plan, with progress on public safety, cleanliness, and addressing homelessness. Councilmember Lana Negrete offered a candid perspective on the steps already underway to make Santa Monica a more welcoming and frictionless place for businesses to operate and grow.
Participants welcomed the direction, but pressed for greater transparency and accountability. A clear consensus emerged around the idea of a public facing scorecard tracking key realignment metrics, including police presence, the status of the planned downtown police substation, and measurable outcomes tied to homelessness spending. Panelists suggested that an accessible digital dashboard could allow residents, business owners, and city leadership to track progress in real time.
Craig Lewis, a placemaking expert with three decades of experience and director of placemaking at Arcadis, delivered one of the forum’s most practical frameworks for revitalization. Drawing on successful downtown transformations from Greenville, South Carolina to Campus Martius Park in Detroit, Lewis emphasized that revitalization rarely happens through a single large project. “It’s singles and doubles, not home runs,” he said, emphasizing incremental activation, consistent programming, and attention to the pedestrian experience.
Lewis stressed the importance of creating compact areas of energy where visitors and residents repeatedly build positive memories. In cities that have successfully revitalized their downtowns, small but consistent improvements to walkability, programming, and public space have compounded into long term transformation.
Councilmember Snell reinforced the city’s commitment to supporting private sector initiatives and signaled political will to reduce the friction that has historically slowed business investment. Fisher of Metropolis, one of downtown Santa Monica’s largest employers and a company focused on mobility innovation and the seamless urban experience, noted that the talent and companies already exist locally.
Irwin of Prism Places brought the leasing and retail perspective, pointing to the opportunity to rethink how commercial space is activated in an era where experience increasingly drives foot traffic more than traditional retail. The message from the first panel was clear: Santa Monica’s assets remain strong, and the next phase will depend on visible, sustained activation.
Scott Painter, one of Santa Monica’s most prolific entrepreneurs who has built multiple companies in the city including Autonomy and TrueCar, offered a founder’s perspective on what it takes to attract and retain talent. “When we recruit talent, people are looking for places that feel alive,” Painter said. “They want a neighborhood that is safe, vibrant, and full of culture. That’s what attracts the professionals who build companies.”
Hybrid work has intensified that dynamic. If employees are not tied to the office every day, cities increasingly compete on quality of life and cultural energy. Several panelists noted that while Venice has seen retail rents rise and cultural activity rebound, Santa Monica’s downtown is still working to regain that same momentum.
Painter argued that the city has an opportunity to adopt a more customer oriented mindset when it comes to doing business. From leasing office space to opening a new storefront, every interaction with the city should be streamlined, digital first, and easy to navigate.
Corvas Brinkerhoff, co-founder of Meow Wolf and a creator known for immersive art experiences that have attracted millions of visitors, spoke about the role of culture and creativity in shaping thriving cities. “If you look at cities that become magnetic,” Brinkerhoff said, “it starts with interesting creative people doing something authentic. Then the rest of the ecosystem follows.”
His current venture Submersive is a next generation immersive wellness destination that blends thermal bathing, art, and technology driven sensory environments. The first location is underway in Austin, and Brinkerhoff noted that Santa Monica is among the cities being evaluated for a second site.
Another major theme was Santa Monica’s potential to lead in emerging industries as a coastal center for innovation. Rohit Shukla, whose Larta Institute has helped more than 10,000 companies commercialize technology innovations and secure more than $20 billion in follow on capital, argued that the city sits at the center of a powerful but underutilized ecosystem. He pointed to the proximity of UCLA, USC, Santa Monica College, and regional hospital systems such as St. John’s Health Center as fertile ground for collaboration between research institutions, entrepreneurs, and investors.
“Santa Monica could become a centerpiece for climate and ocean technology,” Shukla said. “But it requires an intentional strategy to bring the ecosystem together.”
Panelists discussed the idea of creating a Downtown Innovation Center in a vacant space that could function as a hybrid destination where companies showcase technology, residents learn about emerging tools such as artificial intelligence, and entrepreneurs collaborate. Such a space could operate through a public private partnership and highlight Santa Monica’s growing presence in climate technology, mobility innovation, and applied artificial intelligence.
Real estate dynamics were also central to the discussion. Chouluchas described a market undergoing structural change as the office sector adapts to hybrid work. Demand has shifted toward higher quality buildings, leaving older office properties facing declining occupancy. “The office market has experienced a flight to quality,” he said. “Many older assets will have to be reimagined.”
Conversions to residential, medical office, or innovation oriented space may become more common as cities rethink how commercial districts function. Access to debt financing has improved compared with recent years, Chouluchas added, which could open the door for redevelopment opportunities if regulatory barriers can be reduced.
The forum concluded with a call for near term pilots that can quickly bring energy back to downtown. Ideas included pop up markets, cultural programming, immersive art installations, wellness activations, and technology showcases that allow entrepreneurs to test concepts in vacant storefronts.
Flexible short-term leases, panelists noted, could allow businesses to experiment without the risk of long term commitments while bringing immediate activity to underutilized spaces.
CALS plans to synthesize the forum’s discussions into a white paper outlining recommendations for the city’s planning and economic development teams, as well as private sector stakeholders. “Santa Monica has the talent, the capital, and the creative energy,” said Swerdloff. “What it needs is a structured bridge between the private sector and a public process that must move faster, and that is exactly why CALS exists.”
The message that emerged from the forum was consistent that Santa Monica retains the ingredients that made it one of Southern California’s most dynamic coastal cities. What comes next will depend on collaboration between public leadership, private investment, and the creative community. Revitalization, participants agreed, will not come from a single project. It will come from consistent action that makes downtown feel alive again.