September 11, 2000

Dear Editor,

This story ("The City vs. Jacob’s Playhouse," Sept. 11) is just one example of how poorly a weak mayor form of government continually fails.

Almost without exception it breeds an atmosphere of miscommunication and poor knowledge. When everything is left to a "commission" or a "committee" no one person takes the initiative to truly learn all the procedures and nuances of leading... governing.

The fact that the neighbor Garai was able to have so much influence over the project is mind boggling. Our government should be able to field these complaints, have all the knowledge regarding the case in one accessible spot, and be able to say the matter is being handled between the City and the resident, so butt out.

If the City government's right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing, then we have a larger problem than a simple playhouse.

Tom Herlihy

Santa Monica

September 11, 2000

Dear Editor,

I couldn't agree more with Teresa Rochester that it would be a "severe blow" to the city if RAND is not allowed to keep Santa Monica as its home by the City Council. I've served in a number of volunteer organizations alongside my RAND employed neighbors, and have firsthand experience about how much they contribute to the community in which they live!

I fully appreciate that architectural elegance is a matter of personal taste. My own perspective is that if the proposed new RAND headquarters is built exactly as it is currently proposed, it will immediately become one of Santa Monica's landmark buildings and a fabulous addition to Santa Monica Civic Center. It will be a unique architectural addition to a city that through its blend of dynamic business activity, world-renowned tourism and true community spirit can only be characterized as unique!

I wish I could understand the city's perspective on the "single tenant" aspect of the zoning issue. Who among us would lease an apartment, buy a house, or rent space for our business if we were required to use it for our sole use forevermore? We couldn't move out of the apartment, couldn't sell our house to someone else, had to remain in the same location whether our business prospered or withered.

None of us individually could tolerate such a requirement, so how does the city think RAND (or the financial institutions backing the construction) can accept such restrictive covenants? Although RAND as a company has been with us for over 50 years, they are a business susceptible to the laws of supply and demand just like any other business. They need flexibility in the real estate that they occupy to adjust to their own changing business conditions.

Finally, I wonder how much consideration our City Council has given to RAND's contribution to Santa Monica's reputation as a world class tourist destination. Every week, leaders from all over the world are visiting RAND headquarters -- walking distance to our fabulous beaches, hotels,
restaurants, retail establishments, pier...

I can't imagine Santa Monica without my RAND neighbors! I hope the City Council does everything in its power to ensure they have a comfortable home here for many years to come.

Sincerely,

C. Bryce Benjamin
Santa Monica

September 11, 2000

Dear Editor,

Where are the letters? Why are you not publishing them?

I am so pleased with Dr. Richard B. Freeman from Harvard the Nobel laureate in the field of economics, saying that the Dr. Pollin’s report was actually outstanding and makes great sense. He agrees with all the points that Dr. Pollin is making and sets aside the garbeldiguk that the man from the university of the South is saying.

The issue here is still who is making the big bucks and who does not share with the poor workers that help them make the money.

Our community should NOT tolerate this kind of behavior. We gave them (the hotels) the opportunity to make all this money when we voted for proposition S to restrict hotels in the tourist zone. Little did we know then that these hotel owners would become the worst element in our community.

They spent close to a half a million to bring the false initiative to us and now they will spend double and more to ram it down OUR throats. I trust us all NOT to fall for it. Big money from out side our city is creating this poison pill in our community.

VOTE NO ON PROP.KK. VOTE NO ON PROP.KK VOTE NO ON PROP KK

Bruria Finkel

Santa Monica

September 6, 2000

Dear Editor:

I have two things in common with the current majority on the Santa Monica City Council. First, I have practically no experience at managing a successful business that employs many people. Secondly, I recognize the political result of having hundreds of unpaid workers (supplied by one or more labor unions) electioneering on behalf of City Council candidates who will then return the favor when elected.

Those two shared attributes come into play in the issue of living wage ordinance being considered by the City Council and the Living Wage ballot initiative, Proposition KK.

I think Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg stated it well on KCRW on July 14 when asked by Warren Olney what the City of Los Angeles is doing regarding the strike by the Screen Actor’s Guild against producers of commercials, since City permits and City properties are frequently involved. She said it is important that the City of Los Angeles not be dragged into the dispute, that the City needs to remain neutral.

Remaining neutral in labor-management issues outside of the City’s own operations is also a wise course for the Santa Monica City Council.

One reason I support the Living Wage ballot initiative (Prop. KK) is that it would prevent the Santa Monica City Council from getting involved in labor disputes. I have confidence that the existing U.S. and California labor laws and courts can provide for fair settlements of labor-management differences.

Sam Zivi

Santa Monica

September 1, 2000

Dear Editor,

I thought your article on the Airport Commission meeting was excellent.

One thing that's making me a little nervous in the reporting of this issue is keeping clear the distinction between "live/work" space and "day studio" space. The artist spaces at the airport are day studio only, no one is allowed to live there.

A second point, something I alluded to when I spoke but didn't explain very well (because I don't know that much about it), is that artist studio space has very specific physical requirements. I'm going to give you some quotes from standards for visual arts facilities developed by the National Consortium of National Arts Education Consortiums.

1. "General lighting needs to be planned so that shadows are reduced to a minimum in all parts of the room. Lighting the color of daylight permits accuracy of color work, regardless of the changing outdoor conditions. Art rooms should be located so that they may have large windows toward a northern exposure to ensure natural lighting."

2. " The sinks -- very important items in any art room -- are equipped with hot and cold water and sediment traps."

3. Photography - "Be sure that the photography room meets the appropriate ventilation standards for such a facility and that all drain piping in the dark room is acid resistant."

4. Ceramics - "Ceramics requires special equipment and storage facilities. Space should accommodate clay bins that are rustproof, leakproof, airtight, and portable. Facilities should also accommodate such special equipment as potters wheels and a camp box (cabinet) for storing work in progress. Appropriate ventilation must be provided for any clay mixing."

5. Kiln room - "The electric kiln needs 45 square feet. Also needed is a special wiring circuit to meet kiln manufacturer's requirements and state and local codes. The kiln room must be ventilated to the outside to remove fumes as well as heat build-up. Metal storage cabinets for storing kiln shelves, shelf supports, stilts, and kiln wash should also be provided. "

6. Printmaking - "While basic printmaking activities can be carried out on tables, special equipment is required for some procedures. Facilities should accommodate such equipment as printing presses and drying racks. Care must be taken to provide adequate ventilation for the use of inks and solvents and for drying prints."

7. An item mentioned to me by Reenie Matthes, who works at The Art Studio on Santa Monica Blvd. (behind the TAG Gallery), is that they cannot teach oil painting in their classes because they do not have adequate ventilation in their building. They can do acrylics, watercolor, charcoal and pastels, etc. but no oils.

So the point is that artists cannot just set up in any little low-rent office space with no windows, or south-facing windows, or do ceramics without special electrical wiring and adequate plumbing equipment, or use certain types of paint and other chemicals without special ventilation. Some of these things exist at the airport buildings, but I imagine that artists have added skylights, wiring, plumbing, exhaust fans, kilns, and other improvements, and they cannot just move and keep on working, even if low rents were available elsewhere.

Zina Josephs
Arts Commisioner

August 31, 2000

Dear editor,

As usual your reporting is excellent. I have been looking forward to Pollin’s report for almost a year’s time. I just purchased a copy at city hall for $5 dollars I intend to sit this weekend and learn about the findings in this report.

At first look, using the gross income a year ($3 million a year) for a restaurant is probably the way to go rather then employee numbers (50) since it will create a nightmare in policing the number of workers in every establishment.

The other finding that I like is that if one adds 10% to your restaurant bill ($1 to a $10 lunch bill or $3 to your $30 including tax) to a dinner bill you take a worker and his/her three children out of poverty. That is really a simple way to spread the wealth.

The idea that ALL of us participate in the raising of the living wage, should make our community proud.

However the greed level of the hotels that raised the room average from $185 a night to $245 a night, their poisoned proposition will effect only 62 workers in the city is a real disgrace.
Vote NO on prop KK.

The city wide ordinance analysis was a request made by the opposition to the living wage, the chamber of commerce and the hotels.

I believe that most of our underpaid and under appreciated workers are in the coastal zone as the report shows.

I am proud of our council for taking their time to learn and reveal the truth about the conditions of workers in our city. Now I would like to see them do something.

Bruria Finkel

Santa Monica

August 23, 2000

Dear Editor,

Your story on police preparations for the Santa Monica pier protests of August 13 might leave some with the impression that it was only the massive and costly preparations by the Santa Monica Police Department that saved our community from apocalypse.

The truth is, as any one of the many police infiltrators of our organizing networks were surely aware of, both organizers and participants in the protest were overwhelmingly opposed to any form of violence or vandalism, and the massive police presence had nothing to do with the peaceful conduct of our protest.

All government agencies have a natural tendency to inflate their importance along with their budgets and the SMPD is no exception to this rule. Many of their precautions were downright ludicrous, such as ordering Promenade restaurants not to set plates and salt shakers at their outdoor tables for fear of being used as missiles against whatever the police believed we were intent on destroying. As for the bags of urine they were preparing to be hit by, I'm baffled where they came up with that idea.

I have no complaints with how the SMPD conducted themselves during the event, but I find it disturbing that they were prepared to fire pepper balls into crowds and risk putting someone's eye out.

Aside from wasting a great sum of taxpayers money by succumbing to the hysteria of the LAPD's 'intelligence' department, my one major complaint with the conduct of the SMPD was their reneging on their promise not to create an illegal buffer zone to protect the Blue Dog Democrats. In our negotiations before the event, the police promised there would be no First Amendment free zone similar to that the LAPD attempted to circle the Staples Center with, but in fact they fenced off nearly half of the Pier -- all the way east to the boardwalk. In the process they excluded access to the disabled for much of Sunday and created a dangerous situation in the event of fire.

The Santa Monica Police Department needs to learn that free speech is not the same thing as terrorism and they need to listen to the community they serve instead of the troubled and out of control Los Angeles Police Department. In the future Santa Monicans would do well to devise a system that will make our police department more responsible to the community that pays their bills.

Michael Everett

August 23, 2000

Dear Editor,

I was surprised to learn in the story about the Blue Dog event on the Pier that the Red Cross was on hand to assist the Santa Monica Police Department. How delivering 28 pizzas to the police has anything to do with the mission of the Red Cross is beyond me. I can only hope the cost for this mission of mercy didn't come from the funds public spirited citizens donate to the Red Cross in the belief they will be used for the relief of those genuinely in need of emergency assistance.

Surely, as part of their elaborate preparations and expenditure of public funds, the SMPD had made some arrangements to feed their personnel without relying on what is traditionally presumed to be an independent agency and not a police auxiliary.

Michael Everett

August 21, 2000

To the Community of Santa Monica

From the distressed real employees of Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel.

We come to you to ask for your support in a very difficult and confusing situation that has come to disturb our peaceful work environment. The Hotel Employees and Restaurant Local Union "HERE 814" is trying to trick, confuse and force us to sign their Union-Cards and accept their proposition of doing a "card-check" instead of a secret ballot election.

Their famous "card check" will cheat us of a very fundamental right, which is the right to "choose and vote."

They want to impose their will in this Hotel without counting all the employees. Their "card check system" give them the opportunity to unionize the hotel because it will only require 50% of employee's signatures. The other 50% of the employees don't count. This process can take many years to pass until they have reached their goal.

This dirty trick works to their advantage, but it is not a good way to show us democracy.

On the other hand, we request a secret ballot election in which all employees will have the opportunity to vote and choose union or non-union. We want to end this dispute as soon as possible, because it is not only hurting our good reputation and our business; but it's also hurting the good image of this great city.

Daniel Menzor
Cesar Tesen
Van Nuys