The Rent Control Board wants to hear from you.

Attend the public hearing March 22nd at 7:00pm at City Hall. Share your thoughts by email to rentcontrol@smgov.net.

Explore the issuesonline at www.smgov.net/rentcontrol.

Call Rent Control for more information:  (310) 458-8751.

Read the notice on page 7: http://backissues.smdp.com/030918.pdf

And at: https://www.smgov.net/rentcontrol/

A play-by-play recap of why neighbors are appealing the approval of a block-long building on Lincoln Boulevard

By Tim Tunks. Santa Monica resident Tim Tunks is a designer and retired educator.

A few doors down from my small Ocean Park duplex, a new development planned for 2903 Lincoln Blvd. would stretch an entire city block. Where there’s now an auto shop and a plumbing store, picture 47 apartments above ground-floor restaurant and retail spanning the east side of Lincoln between Ashland Avenue and Wilson Place — four stories tall on the north end and, at 308 feet, stretching far enough to overlap the goal lines on both ends of the Rose Bowl. Drive down Lincoln from Montana Avenue to LAX, and you won’t see a building with as much potential impact on north-south traffic flow.

The Santa Monica Planning Commission approved this project during a public hearing on Jan. 10.

Read More: https://argonautnews.com/the-development-game-santa-monica-edition/

Santa Monica City’s Architectural Review Board (ARB), established in 1974, acts “to preserve existing areas of natural beauty, cultural importance and assure that buildings, structures, signs or other developments are in good taste, good design, harmonious with surrounding developments, and in general contribute to the preservation of Santa Monica’s reputation as a place of beauty, spaciousness and quality.”

The ARB is basically there to assure the taxpaying residents that the project will “preserve existing areas of natural beauty” be “harmonious” with “surrounding developments”, and “preserve Santa Monica’s reputation as a place of beauty and spaciousness”. One might wonder if replacement of an existing two story building and an open parking lot, adjacent to two single family historic houses, with a complex of five multi-story structures, up to 150 ft. tall, fulfills that criteria. Apparently the members of the ARB thought so, as they unanimously supported the hotel project.

Read More: https://smmirror.com/2018/03/sma-r-t-arb-ready-build/

March 9, 2018 -- With a string of violent crimes stoking community fear, Santa Monica Interim Police Chief Kenneth Semko on Thursday said major crime had risen 6 percent in the first two months of 2018, adding that police have been re-deployed to provide “an immediate” impact on both crime and the community’s “perception of safety.”

The 5.8 percent increase in crime in January and February is roughly equal to “one additional crime a day over last year,” when serious crime jumped 12.5 percent, Semko said in a message to the community posted on the City’s website.

“Troubling as these trends are to all of us in the Police Department, the number of annual crimes in Santa Monica remain well below historic rates of crime from 1965-2000,” he said.http://www.surfsantamonica.com/ssm_site/the_lookout/news/News-2018/March-2018/03_09_2018_Interim_Police_Chief_Says_Major_Crime_in_Santa_Monica_Up_but_Low_by_Historic_Standards.html

March 7, 2018 -- Although the City has already done “more than its fair share,” Santa Monica City Manager Rick Cole says concepts such as erecting a “Tiny House Village” for the rising homeless population are being discussed.

Cole said the City would consider creating a community of micro dwellings only as part of a region-wide effort to place such small homeless neighborhoods in other areas as well.

Read More:   http://www.surfsantamonica.com/ssm_site/the_lookout/news/News-2018/March-2018/03_07_2018_Santa_Monica_Considering_Tiny_House_Village_and_Other_New_Shelter_for_Homeless_City_Managers_Says.html

The President has term limits. Congress doesn’t but here are good arguments pro and con. Most Governors do (38 of 50); ours does. All our elected state officials except the Insurance Commissioner do. Most cities in California have them for their city councils. And here in Santa Monica we have term limits for just about everyone, even volunteer commission and board members — but not for our City Council. You have to ask, why is that?

Or maybe you don’t have to ask. In many cities where term limits were established, it was their city council who initiated the process. I’d say those are cities with representatives more concerned with serving their constituents by perpetuating good governance and limiting possibilities for corruption, than in personally getting re-elected, over and over and over.

Read More: http://smdp.com/curious-city-as-the-world-terms/164785

· The 2018 point-in-time homeless count total is up 4% from 921 individuals in 2016 to 957.

· Within the street count, individuals sleeping in vehicles/encampments increased to 104 people, up from 92.

Read More: http://www.smobserved.com/story/2018/03/07/news/santa-monica-homeless-count-shows-four-percent-increase/3351.html

AND

http://smdp.com/santa-monica-sees-11-percent-increase-in-unsheltered-population/164776

AND

http://www.surfsantamonica.com/ssm_site/the_lookout/news/News-2018/March-2018/03_07_2018_Santa_Monicas_Homeless_Population_Continued_to_Rise_in_2018_but_at%20_Slower_Pace.html

March 6, 2018 -- Three decades after it was first proposed, an early childhood education center will break ground at the Santa Monica Civic Center this month, officials from Santa Monica College (SMC) announced last week.

Slots also will be open to the children of those who work in Santa Monica, including employees of the City, SMC and RAND, which participated in the planning and provided funding.

Read More: http://surfsantamonica.com/ssm_site/the_lookout/news/News-2018/March-2018/03_06_2018_Long_Awaited_Santa_Monica_Early_Childhood_Center_to_Break_Ground.html

The origins of and potential solutions to California’s housing crisis, explained.

Over the past several years, California has not only produced too little housing, but too little of the right kind of housing. Between 2009 and 2014, the state added 77,000 more households than housing units. The housing it has produced is often located far from jobs and transit, or is too expensive for low and sometimes even middle income people to afford.

“It’s a desperate situation right now,” said Dowell Myers, an urban planning professor at University of Southern California. “We really have to rethink everything.”

The City Council will learn the scope of the current homeless crisis Tuesday when City Manager Rick Cole reveals the numbers from this year’s January homeless tally during their first meeting in March.

A new public/private partnership to brainstorm new ways to tackle the homeless crisis also gets off the ground this week. The City’s new Homeless Steering Committee (SMHSC) will meet for the first time Wednesday, March 7 at 6 p.m. at Roosevelt Elementary Auditorium at 801 Montana Avenue. The committee is a gathering of more than 50 public and private partners from local businesses, churches, service providers and elected officials to develop strategies to address homelessness.

Read More: http://smdp.com/council-will-learn-homeless-count-results-tonight/164764