By Lookout Staff

February 6, 2012 -- Arthur J. "Kip" Dellinger, Jr. – The Lookout’s new regular columnist -- is as Santa Monica as you can get.

He was raised in and has spent most of his life in the city, and his current home looks over Lincoln Middle School – where his parents met in 1931 and where his dad, Art Dellinger, held the record in the 100 yard dash for 27 years, until Kip broke it. And it's where he was elected student body parliamentarian.

Kip graduated from Roosevelt, Lincoln and Samohi, where he was an All Bay Area pass receiver and Bay League Champion in the 440 yard dash his senior year and earned 5 varsity letters. He also ran with a local crowd that ruled the streets, drove fast but inexpensive cars, dated pretty local girls and defended the underdog.

In the 1960s, he coached three Little League teams and a Pony League team to City Championships in baseball, and his Little Conference football teams won 2 championships. (Local land use attorney Chris Harding was the quarterback of the first of those championship football teams.)

In the early 1970s, he grew his hair long (which got him kicked out of a fancy hotel), was a tax advisor for defense funds for Daniel Ellsberg and for the anti-war activist group Another Mother for Peace and successfully fought enormous IRS tax assessments for donors to the McGovern for President campaign. Then he served as Treasurer for Ronald Reagan's political action committee. (His mother Dolly was the president's personal assistant).

Kip is currently one of the nation's most respected CPAs, receiving the 2011 Saul Braverman Award from the California Society of CPAs for "distinguished service in tax practice in the accounting profession." He is the author of the Federal Tax Practice Standards volume for the CCH Tax Practice & Procedure Library, among numerous publications.

Kip returned to Santa Monica two years ago after living in nearby Brentwood for 11 years, during which he still made his daily three to four-mile run into Santa Monica.

So, what can our readers expect from Kip?

They can expect an accountant's trained eye to help explain how the City spends their tax dollars and how, as in every city, burg and town, money influences politics. They also can expect him to provide an occasional guided tour of the Santa Monica of years past.

And they can look forward to a unique take on how the city by the bay once known as the "People's Republic of Santa Monica" was transformed into "Beverly Hills by the Sea," and all with the same players in power.

Or as Kip says in his first column: the more things change, the more they stay the same.