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By Jorge Casuso
August 16 -- Planning
Commissioner Terry O’Day
will serve a second term on
the powerful board, while former
chair Darrell Clarke failed
in his unusual bid to serve
a third term, as the City Council
made three crucial appointments
to the commission Tuesday night.
In addition to O’Day,
the council appointed Gleam
Davis, an education activist
who has run for the School Board
and City Council, and Jim Ries,
a land use consultant who chairs
of the Sustainable City Task
Force.
The reappointment of O’Day,
who is executive director of
Environment Now, Davis and Ries
assures the board will likely
pursue a moderate stance on
development, while pushing a
green agenda.
O’Day’s appointment
four years ago began a shift
from the slow-growth commission
headed by former City Council
member Kelly Olsen, who was
viewed as a crusader against
major development.
A member of the city’s
powerful tenants group, Santa
Monicans for Renters’
Rights, Davis, recently removed
her name from contention for
an open seat on the School Board.
Davis, who currently serves
as co-chair of the School District’s
bond committee, outlined a sustainable
agenda on her application form
to the commission.
“My goal would be to
complete the current work on
the Land Use and Circulation
Element and to preserve the
diversity, sustainability, and
livability of our neighborhoods,”
Davis, an in-house counsel to
AT&T, wrote on her application.
“I am interested in opportunities
to expand parks and other public
open spaces and I would work
to integrate planning and public
transportation policies,”
she wrote.
Ries, who has been involved
in neighborhood efforts, shares
Davis’ goals.
“I want to work towards
an aesthetically interesting,
vital and sustainable City offering
recreational, employment, educational
and living opportunities to
the City’s diverse population,”
wrote Ries, who has a Masters
Degree in Urban Planning from
the UCLA School of Architecture
and Urban Planning.
His failed bid for a third
term -- which would have required
five council votes -- was a
disappointment for Clarke, who
has worked on the ongoing process
to update the City’s General
Plan, which will dictate development
for the next quarter century.
A champion of public transit,
Clarke also was looking forward
to continuing to push to bring
light rail to Santa Monica,
as City officials begin a process
that will help decide where
to place the terminals and what
development will rise around
them.
“The next year is really
important,” Clarke, who
is the long-time co-chair of
Friends of the Expo Line, told
The Lookout last month.
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