By Frank Gruber

May 25, 2010 -- When Santa Monica embarked six years ago on what (was) supposed to be a two-year jaunt to draft new land use and circulation elements (LUCE) for its general plan, the first political issue -- and politics are inseparable from land use -- was about who would write the plan. The Planning Commission claimed the right to do so based on language in the City's Charter. (See the November 11, 2004 column, "Suspicious Minds" .)

This language, which said that the Planning Commission would "prepare" the general plan, inconveniently came up against the fact that the City Council would ultimately have to pass it. The City Attorney came up with a ruling that sensibly split the difference and said more or less that the commission would draft and recommend a plan, but the council would have the last word.

That explains, if you care to know, why so many of the public hearings on the LUCE have formally been meetings of the Planning Commission.

The one takeaway issue from this is that nowhere in the City Charter or anywhere else does it say that planning staff, consultants, or environmental impact report writers would enact the LUCE. The experts can do all the drafting they want, do all the analyzing they want, conduct all the workshops they want, but ultimately a general plan is the product of the political process. It is people involved in that process -- planning commissioners and city council members -- who make the final decisions based on their weighing of every factor of which they can take cognizance.

Welcome to democracy.

It so happens that the Planning Commission, after all these years of listening, is now conducting extensive hearings on the LUCE and preparing to revise the planning department's draft. This is an inherently political process, and the hearings have engendered political responses. People representing various constituencies in town are arguing for changes.

The Chamber of Commerce sent a letter, written by land use attorney Chris Harding, to the commission suggesting changes to the draft plan. In response, the Santa Monica Coalition for a Livable City (SMCLC) wrote a letter, co-signed by six neighborhood associations, denouncing the Chamber's letter, as a "blatant attempt to derail the core vision and policies of the LUCE."

Meanwhile the SMCLC said that it would be advocating for its own changes to the LUCE to make it "stronger and stricter on limiting development."

This column is not going to be about substantive issues, except to say that to some extent I hope that both the Chamber and the SMCLC can persuade the commission to make changes to the draft LUCE. As I have written before, the draft LUCE favors commercial development too heavily over residential in the city's former industrial lands. Yet the draft is also overly detailed and restrictive on many policies, and relies too much on discretionary review of future projects.

A good, contentious dialogue over the LUCE will be a good thing. The draft needs review by people who will be affected by it; much as war is too important to be left to generals, land use is too important to be left to planners.

But can we stop with the trash talk?

I'm speaking about the SMCLC's letter, which attacks the motives of the Chamber and of a local law firm -- Harding, Larmore, Kutcher & Kozal. The Chamber of Commerce, representing many businesses that have been in Santa Monica for decades if not generations, is not merely a "special interest group." If the Chamber has Chris Harding -- a "resident" as much as anyone in the SMCLC -- write a letter for them he's not merely a "paid lobbyist."

Look -- I'm a liberal ready to regulate business at the drop of my hat, but let's remember something: nearly all of the Santa Monica that the SMCLC's members profess to love so much was built, planned, and/or paid for by businessmen and women. To say that local business and property owners don't care for the city as much as the "residents" the SMCLC purports to speak for is silly.

And memo to the SMCLC -- after the thrashing your RIFT initiative got in the 2008 election, perhaps a little humility is in order? Specifically, what besides self-righteousness gives you (and the other self-appointed neighborhood associations) the right to speak for, as you put it, "our community"?

Here's an idea: how about suggesting that your points be evaluated on their merits, not on your own mystical sense of what residents want? This might be especially helpful when you get to the City Council, where you will be addressing people who have actually won elections.

* * *

Speaking about the City Council, and speaking about good projects, tomorrow night the council will consider a development agreement (DA) "float-up" for a proposed moderately-priced hotel at Seventh and Wilshire. The project will include adaptive re-use of a landmarked office building at 710 Wilshire, turning it into a hotel, new construction for more of the hotel on the parking lot just south of 710 Wilshire, and the building of an apartment building on an adjacent lot on Lincoln.

Perhaps not coincidentally, Chris Harding's law firm represents the developer and the SMCLC has sent a letter to the council arguing that the developer should be required to give extensive public benefits in return for approval of the project.

There has been a lot of controversy about DA's recently, but in this instance one will be entirely appropriate.

As the staff report for the project points out, the project extends over eight lots and three zoning districts. Without a DA, each lot might be developed separately. With a DA the City can get a unified project that is better than the sum of the possible parts.

The City should negotiate whatever public benefits it can get, but let's be clear -- this whole project is a public benefit. To begin with, part of it will revitalize a landmark building by converting it from offices to a hotel, most of the rest of it will be on what's now a barren parking lot in a part of downtown that could use new development, and included in the package will be housing on Lincoln.

Parking lot that is site for proposed new hotel

Then there are the economics. Any other city would be salivating at the chance to get an estimated $85 million investment in its downtown, but here the staff report doesn't even mention the economic benefits. As a hotel, the business will contribute millions of dollars of bed-tax and other revenues to the City.

Groups like the SMCLC that oppose development always want more parks, but any decent sized park costs millions of dollars a year to operate. We need more parks, but to pay their costs, we need to increase the overall wealth in the city. That's what developments like 710 Wilshire do.

And unlike allowing more "creative office space" on the industrial lands around Bergamot Station, a new hotel would reflect Santa Monica's historic economic identity as a tourist destination, and the location downtown would not entail significant collateral problems.

Just say yes.

Frank J. Gruber is the author of Urban Worrier: Making Politics Personal, available at Hennessey + Ingalls and Angel City books in Santa Monica, at City Image Press, and on amazon.com.