Catching Up on the Mail: Crosswalks, the Boathouse and TORCA II

June 29, 2000

To: council@pen.ci.santa-monica.ca.us
Subject: car phones

Well, now there are two little old ladies dead because someone was on
their car phone.....and afterwards all she had was a bad attitude!

I am curious - what were the "number of reasons" to put the cell phone
ban on hold by the Council???

I really do not understand the workings of Santa Monica City, who are so strict and archaic in so many other respects, yet have failed to do
something about this blatant danger....did you not read the statistics
that say drivers using phones are four times more likely to have an
accident???

I am sick of getting cut off, ignored, not seen, almost killed by
someone running a stop sign.....(one woman went through the stop sign on her phone and waved to us!) Are the yuppies so concerned with their
blankety-blank social/business lives pressuring you that much?!

When is government, local AND federal going to put a ban on using these phones while driving? How many more deaths is it going to take?

June 29, 2000

Dear Editor:

In unbelievable acts of deception at local markets, paid petitioners are
asking signers to support rent control, while gathering signatures from
people who may lose their homes because they signed. Cute homemade
signs declare "Santa Monica Residents, Preserve and Protect Rent
Control, Your Homes and Neighborhoods. Support SMRPH (Santa Monica Residents Protection and Homeownership Charter Amendment) Sign a Petition Today!"

SMRPH is not related to SMRR. The SMRR Housing and Steering Committees have studied this condo conversion measure and oppose it. It has numerous weaknesses and dangerous pitfalls. We urge you not to sign. If youíve already signed in error, we urge you to revoke your signature.

To remove your signature from the petition, write to the City Clerk,
City of Santa Monica, Box 2200, Santa Monica, CA 90407-2200. Request your name be removed from the "SMRPH Charter Amendment" petition because you signed by mistake. Print your name as registered to vote. Give your address where you are registered. Date it. Sign as you usually do for official election matters.

While many apartment owners and a few tenants may benefit from the
measure if it makes the ballot and passes, the vast majority of renters
who become involved in this condo conversion plan will likely regret it.

Its tentacles may spread wide and capture many an unsuspecting prey.
"Tenants" in fifty per cent of the units can authorize the building to
convert. The "tenants" can combine with any entities from anywhere to
form a Tenant Purchasing Group (TPG), so long as 51% of the voting power is held by "tenants." However, under the measure, owners who live on the property are deemed "tenants." Watch out!

The TPG may enter into a contract with the owner to buy the property,
contingent on getting its condo conversion through the Planning
Commission. The Planning Commission, in almost every instance, will not be able to stop the conversion.

Then each actual tenant will, by operation of law, be forced into an
"Irrevocable 99 Year Lease," that canít be amended. While the "Lease"
sounds inviting, it actually gives very little for the price to be paid,
and it may preclude negotiation for better terms. One of the new
leaseís terms prohibits new subtenants and roommates. Costs of repairs
and improvements not listed in the condo conversion application can lead to enormous rent increases for actual tenants still on the property.

It will be in the new owners' interests to have vacant units to sell.
This wonít make for cordial relations between the new owners and
tenants. Of course, the old owners will have every reason to get rid of
tenants (who don't want to purchase) before tenants vote on the
conversion. Vacant units are not counted in that vote. Watch out
again! This is another incentive for harassment and intimidation.

The last condo conversion charter amendment (TORCA) sunsetted in 1996. It failed to reach its lofty goal of "Tenant Ownership Rights." Of
approximately 3000 converted units, about 230 were sold to prior
tenants. Many tenants were pushed or intimidated out of their units.
Emotional struggles between owner occupants and the few remaining tenant occupants continue.

One thing TORCA provided that was good. A conversion tax raised over $4 million for low income housing. Alas, SMRPH has no tax.

The author of both TORCA and SMRPH is Paul DeSantis, and guess what he does for a living. He is a real estate attorney who, until 1996, made a lot of money helping apartment owners convert to condos.

Don't sign the SMRPH petition. If you signed already, revoke today.
Spread the word. Many people have signed who should have been more careful.

Michael Tarbet
SMRR Organizer
Attorney
Santa Monica

Jun 29, 2000

Dear Editor:

Re: The lights are all screwed up!

The latest insult to pedestrians is the right turn arrow at Ocean and
Colorado giving priority to vehicles.....A travesty for a city that
purports to be pedestrian friendly!

The light at 2nd and Colorado is equally disconcerting, and confusing.
If the traffic person Lucy Dykes were to make first hand observations
of the confusion that these signals cause I'm sure she would correct
them. These are only the tip of the iceberg, inch by inch, intersection
by intersection this city is fast becoming a hell hole for pedestrians and H.P.V.s.

Perhaps the settings of traffic lights meet Ms. Dyke's planning criteria but they do nothing for the people of this city. I cannot in all honesty believe that an inventory of signal settings has been done recently, or else we would not have the massive discrimination against pedestrians that we do. The mathematician Stephen Hawkings, for all his brilliance would be unable to cross many of our intersections because his illness would prevent him from pushing the button that controls the light.

Yes! There are many intersections that will stay red until hell freezes
over unless you push the button (Trying to push the button whilst riding
a bicycle....a real pain!). Los Angeles has begun to install devices
that detect the presence of humans.....so the technology is clearly
extant that would allow us to do the same. Until such time as we install
these devices all lights must be made to cycle periodically on their own
so that humans may pass without the requisite push of a button, as do
vehicles. (Dear City Council kindly forward to Ms. Dykes as the email
address I have for her no longer works.) Thanks!

Steven G Keats
Santa Monica

July 06, 2000

To:Steven G Keats

cc: council@pen2.ci.santa-monica.ca.us; editor@surfsantamonica.com

Re: The lights are all screwed up!

The new green light phasing was instituted because pedestrians walk against the "don't walk" signs, thereby not allowing cars to turn right at both those intersections, backing up traffic for blocks on Colorado.

We are trying our darnedest to make sure cars and pedestrians move safely and easily through key intersections in the downtown and beach area. This includes having additional traffic control presence on busy summer weekends to make sure both drivers and pedestrians obey the signals.

Judy Rambeau
Spokesperson
City of Santa Monica

Tuesday, June 27, 2000

Dear Editor:

A postcard was mailed to tell us that we're going to get yet more mail from the city (Whether we want it or not!) an environmental guide (hmm all that paper and they call it an environmental guide).

When I asked about it I was told that it's necessary to whet the public's appetite for the upcoming publication because we have to compete with the likes of Disney for their attention, and that it was determined to be cost effective???

Assuredly Disney cannot compete with the grand comedy that passes for
governance in this city. I admit that the card was chipper and
cute......if they'd utilized the designer's talents on something useful
like the new restrooms I suspect they would have ended up looking less
like prisons.

Santa Monica........the movie couldn't be more entertaining than the
city itself. But yes I'm working on the screenplay anyway!
Cheers........S

Steven G Keats

June 27, 2000

Dear Editor:

Amazing; Madam O'Conner complained because I wrote a letter to the
Editor, just answering her letter to the Editor on June 01, 2000.

She thinks she is the only one who has the right to express her point of
view. Madam, you are a Councilman in Santa Monica and I live in Santa
Monica and I have the right to state what I like, and that is that I
wish you will never run for the City Council position again, ESPECIALLY SINCE IT WAS YOU WHO PROTESTED ABOUT THE DIFFICULTIES OF THIS POSITION.

It is you, Madam, who speaks about $750.00, and why must you report if you receive a free dinner, and that no one can run for the above
position with all the rules one must obey, and I hope you do report all
you receive.

Moreover, in the letter addressed to me you are stating that it is NOT an
honor to serve but a sacrifice. A sacrifice? You receive $750.00
each month plus all the extra little goodies along the way, and you make
rules for others while you offer nothing. Let the citizens of this city
know how many renters you have in your buildings, and let us know if you allow them to live in your property below market price? Do tell the
people of this city how many jobs you are offering to the public, jobs
you have created as a private citizen, in other words, what have you
created for the betterment of mankind?

It is your crying letter of June 01, 2000, which will make people think
if it is worth a run for the Council Seat; it is your letter to me where
people will learn that to serve is not an honor, it is you who is
discouraging future Council People.

If you would have sent your letter to the Editor as a private citizen I
would have said -- not a word -- but you sent the letter as a Councilman,
and since you represent me... I have the right to tell you that I am not
happy with the job you do as a Councilman.

Your words Madam, you are a Hard Working Stiff who cannot accept
something free unless you report it and then it becomes income. Your
words again Madam, You Have Thick Skin. What you are telling me is that you will run again, and I wish you would not, but, if the payment for
tis job is not enough, and if it is such a burden to do this job.

PLEASE, GIVE IT UP!

Maria Sirotti
Santa Monica

June 29, 2000

Dear Editor:

I agree the Boathouse structure is a unique building and a long- standing part of the pier. However, the problem with the Boathouse is in the careless and sloppy way it has been operated by the daughter of the founder.

There have been nothing but problems since the daughter has taken over. There have been numerous, on-going violations of the Boathouse's CUP especially in relation to the "downstairs" room. There has been live
entertainment and dancing in the room which is expressly forbidden by the CUP among numerous other conditions that have been ignored.

She has leased out the downstairs room to party promoters who have had "public parties" in the room that have been widely advertised by flyers to underage (18 and over) "kids" in the inner city.

Hundred of kids and young adults have been drawn to the pier to hang around when they can't get into the parties where they fight and cause trouble. These events that have brought a criminal element to the pier, time and again, yet the operator claims she knows nothing about them and can't do anything because they are "private parties."

The police have responded to well over 200 complaints at the facility ranging from fights, shootings, vandalism, public intoxication, drug-dealing to loud noise and general public disturbances in just the last two or three years. The ABC has issued numerous citations in the facility for underage drinking, serving inebriates and other similar violations. The Boathouse operation has and continues to be a major problem business on the pier and in the community -- for visitors, the police and the other pier businesses. The present operator has taken almost no steps to correct any of the ongoing problems.

When asked for presentations on what she would do with the facility if her lease were extended by the PRC, she replied that she would turn it into a tribute to Indian Motorcycles or an Indian Motorcycle-themed restaurant. A biker themed restaurant sure doesn't sound historical or pier-friendly to me.

And, it's just what is needed on top of all the other problems - lots of biker types on the pier (better they and their noisy 'hogs' stay at Big Deans on the Boardwalk.) None of this sounds good for a family oriented -- historical themed, pier food and drink establishment to me.

The present operator doesn't have a clue. Not only has she done a miserable job with the Boathouse, she would like to redevelop it in a way that has nothing to do with Santa Monica, Its history, the pier, the beach or anything that we hold dear. And, thank God, someone at the PRC and with the City has recognized this.

Too bad that there isn't a local operator that would develop this is an 'old time, family, pier/history oriented eatery come forward -- but that hasn't happened. So that leaves the entities that did express interest in taking ove the lease such as The Lobster - who would like to open a more reasonably price version to their high- priced/small portions/OK food Pier entrance restaurant and a couple of franchises such as Bubba Gump Shrimp.

I can assure you that there is no way the present Boathouse operation can and should continue. As a person who worked long and hard in the 1970's to "Save the Pier." I can assure you that the current Boathouse is not something that does the pier's reputation any good. In fact, the Boathouse has given the pier a bad name and helped to reinforce the pier's image as a problem area where crime and drunks abound.

In responding to Mr Scheer's column in last week's "Our Times," he should have checked out the whole picture because his take on the Boathouse is very slanted and one sided, as usual.

Bill Bauer
Santa Monica