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By Jorge Casuso
January 5 -- 2008 was a year of big -- sometimes
sensational -- headlines. It was a year that saw defining
events that will long shape the future of the beachside city,
as well as tragic crimes that grabbed headlines far beyond
its borders.
While the political landscape remained little changed by a major election,
the Downtown was transformed both by the votes of property owners and
by the wrecking ball.
Stories that had dragged on for years finally came to a conclusion, or
at least a major turning point in 2008, while others, like the battle
over the Downtown ficus trees or the war known as RIFT, seemed to dominate
the news for months on end.
On the crime blotter, two victims were brutally killed inside their homes,
gang violence once again broke out in the Pico Neighborhood and a middle
school teacher was set to prison for sexually molesting his students.
It was a year that closed the tragic chapter of an elderly driver who
took a deadly ride through a crowded farmers market five years earlier,
and a year that saw the long-awaited Expo Light Rail begin materializing
on the horizon.
Here, in no particular order, are the top stories in 2008:
1. The members of the City Council will head into a collective
century of service after all four incumbents swept to easy
victories in the race for four council seats last November.
Newly elected mayor Ken Genser is now serving a record sixth
four-year term, while out-going mayor Herb Katz is beginning
a fifth term. (“Four
Council Incumbents Sweep to Victory,” November 5, 2008)
Bobby Shriver, who won the second-highest vote total ever in a local
council race, is the shortest serving member, entering his second term,
while Richard Bloom is headed into his second decade of service. All told,
the seven council members have put in more than 90 years on the council.
While the faces stayed the same, the election seemed to erase long-standing
divisions between Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights (SMRR) and
the city’s business community. For the first time in its 30-year
history, the tenants group only endorsed two council candidates in a race
with four open seats. Shriver and Kevin McKeown, who was the top vote
getter in 2004, have become the dissenting voices on a council that has
found little to disagree over.
While SMRR candidates once again swept every open seat on the School
and College boards, the powerful tenants group was embarrassed by the
historic election of Robert Kronovet, a Republican landlord and realtor,
to the Rent Control Board. Kronovet is the first candidate in three decades
to oppose SMRR and win a Rent Board seat.
The year, however, was dominated by the aptly named RIFT
(the Residents’ Initiative to Fight Traffic), a controversial
ballot measure to curb commercial development that pitted
a half-dozen local unions against an equal number of neighborhood
groups, and residents against residents. (“Prop
T Goes Down,” November 5, 2008)
In the end, the well-heeled opposition put the brakes on the measure,
also known as Prop T, which would have limited most commercial development
in the city to 75,000 square feet a year for the next 15 years.
In addition, voters easily approved a $295 million bond to
fund modernization projects on Santa Monica College’s
half-century-old main campus and its satellite facilities
and gave the City the go-ahead to update Santa Monica's Utility
Users tax (UUT). (“Measures
AA and SM Win,” November 6, 2008)
2. 2008 was a year of big changes for Downtown Santa Monica. For the
first time in two decades, the Bayside District got a new management structure,
Santa Monica Place began undergoing a metamorphosis and nearly three dozen
projects were underway.
The new Downtown management will oversee $3.6 million generated
by assessments based on a property’s size, type of use
and location. The money will be used to boost maintenance,
enhance marketing efforts and create an “ambassador
program” to inform visitors and help keep the streets
safe. (“New
Downtown Assessment District Passes,” July 11, 2008)
Unlike the current Downtown Assessment District, which only taxed retail
properties, the new PBAD taxes office and apartment buildings, restaurants,
hotels and properties owned by government and non-profit agencies.
Not all the changes were bureaucratic. In April, a key corner
of Downtown Santa Monica came full circle and an era ended
with a bang, when the old Santa Monica Place sign came crashing
down amidst the smoke of an explosion. (“The
Rebirth of a Mall,” April 20, 2008)
The ceremony -- featuring a marching band, fireworks and confetti –
marked the end of a major retail venture and launched an ambitious remodel
of the Frank Gehry-designed shopping mall that opened with much fanfare
in 1980.
Slated to open in 2010, the new mall will feature an open-air courtyard,
upscale shops and a food court on the top floor with sweeping ocean views.
In addition to blowing the roof off Santa Monica Place, construction
crews were busy last year giving the Downtown a major makeover.
(“Downtown
Gets Major Makeover,” September 17, 2008)
The nearly three dozen projects – which range from those in the
planning process to those that only await a final inspection – include
a new maintenance facility for the Big Blue Bus, the $8.2 million streetscape
project along 2nd and 4th streets and three rebuilt public parking structures
along the two streets.
In the end, there will be 629 new residential units in 15 new buildings,
1,700 new parking spaces and 526 new hotel rooms, six mixed-used buildings
and four commercial buildings.
3. Santa Monica was rocked in May when Lincoln Middle School
teacher Arthur Beltran, 61, was arrested for sexually molesting
one of his students. A subsequent investigation found that
the 12-year-old girl was not alone. (“Lincoln
Middle School Teacher Arrested for Molesting Students,”
May 5, 2008)
Last month, Beltran, who had worked in the district for 30 years, pleaded
guilty to molesting nine girls in a string of crimes that dates back to
2000. He also admitted he had molested two others but was not charged
in those cases because the statute of limitations had expired. He will
spend 14 years in state prison.
Beltran, who faced the prospect of life in prison, reached the plea deal
shortly before a preliminary hearing in the case was set to begin. The
counts against the English as a Second Language (ESL) teacher included
continuous sexual abuse, lewd act on a child and sexual penetration with
a foreign object of a child younger than age 14. Beltran will be required
to register as a sex offender when he is released from prison.
Beltran’s arrest in May quickly made headlines up and down the state,
and press and television crews swarmed the middle school campus. The district
offered counseling for students and met with worried parents, who felt
the district had not done enough to stop the crimes.
4. The arrest of Arthur Beltran wasn’t the only news that shook
up the School District in 2008. Two years of protest by the parents of
Special Education students finally managed to bring about major changes
to the beleaguered program. |
For years, the parents had charged that top
administrators were strong-arming them into agreements they couldn’t
discuss and that the district was short-shrifting the needs of their children.
While the complaints had fallen on deaf ears, this time an independent
consultant issued a report that confirmed the allegations
The report found that although the District met and exceeded many of
the criteria, its policy of entering into agreements with parents, though
legal, was not commonly used and not necessarily good practice. The confidentiality
clauses, consultants said, made it difficult to evaluate a student’s
progress and made placing students transferring to another district more
difficult. The policy also breeds distrust.
The controversy led to the resignation of deputy superintendent
Tim Walker, who was in charge of special education. (“Walker
Resigns Post Amidst Special Ed Controversy,” May 2,
2008) Weeks later, Superintendent Dianne Talarico
resigned to take over a small district in Northern California.
("Superintendent
Talarico to Join Burlingame School District," May 30,
2008)
5. Local news in the first half of 2008 was dominated by
the battle over the City’s plan to chop down 23 ficus
trees along 2nd and 4th streets. But an anticipated showdown
in the media spotlight was averted on an early May morning
when City crews removed the trees before the bustling Downtown
came to life. (City
Chops Down Ficus Trees,” May 16, 2008)
Members of Treesavers -- the grassroots group that staged public demonstrations,
packed the council chambers and took the City to court -- rushed to the
scene too late to chain themselves to the trees and put into practice
the lessons they had learned in special civil disobedience classes.
The City’s move came less than two days after an Appeals Court
rejected a case filed by Treesavers in March and lifted a temporary stay
order, paving the way for an $8.2 million streetscape project that called
for removing and relocating 30 of the 157 ficus trees.
The streetscape currently underway calls for, among other things, planting
120 new ginko trees, adding decorative up-lighting to the remaining ficus
trees and repairing sidewalks or curbs damaged by their roots.
6. The Framers’ market tragedy that killed ten people
and injured more than 60 in July 2003 finally found a sense
of closure in May, when the City of Santa Monica settled the
case for $21 million. (“City
Settles Farmers Market Case for $21 Million,” May 22,
2008)
The settlement came on the third day of jury selection in a case that
involved the consolidated claims of dozens of victims against both he
City and the Bayside District. The City’s settlement payment will
be made with insurance proceeds. In return for the settlement payment,
all of the plaintiffs dismissed their claims against both parties.
George Russell Weller, the elderly driver, who plowed his car through
the crowded market on July 16, 2003 had been criminally prosecuted by
the District Attorneys office and convicted in 2006. But victims and their
families filed numerous suits against the City and the Bayside claiming
they were liable for failing to protect marketgoers when the 86-year-old
driver tore through the crowded Downtown street at 60 miles per hour.
The plaintiffs argued that the City’s handwritten traffic control
plan was inadequate. A Superior court judge disagreed, ruling that the
City should not stand trial because it had a traffic control plan in place.
But a State Appeals Court overturned the ruling.
7. Back-to-back homicides in March -- both of them inside the victims’
residences -- put Santa Monicans on edge, while two killings in the Pico
Neighborhood rekindled fears in the gang-prone neighborhood.
The first homicide victim of the year -- Juliana Maureen
Redding, a 21-year-old aspiring model -- was found dead on
March 16 in her Santa Monica apartment on Centinela Avenue,
the apparent victim of assault. (“21-year-old
Woman Found Dead After Apparent Assault,” March 18,
2009)
Four days later, Alexander Merman, a 35-year-old artist, was
found dead in his Montana Avenue condo apparently as a result
of blunt force trauma. (“Man
Found Dead in Montana Avenue Apartment, Victim of 2nd Santa
Monica Homicide,” March 20, 2008)
Both victims were found after their mothers tried to contact them. Police
do not believe the cases are related. No arrests have been made.
Less than two months later, Preston Brumfield died of injuries
suffered when he was assaulted in a park in the Pico Neighborhood
on May 11 ("Assault
Victim Becomes Year’s 3rd Homicide," May 22, 2008)
One month later and less than three blocks away from the
site of Brumfield’s murder, Byron Lopez, a 28-year-old
Latino man was gunned down, marking the fourth homicide of
the year and the 39th in the violence-prone neighborhood since
1989. Lopez was shot shortly before 10 p.m. in the area of
the 2000 block of Court 19, a gang-riddled pocket of the Pico
Neighborhood. (“Man
Killed in Pico Neighborhood,” June 30, 2008)
Gang violence erupted once again in the Pico Neighborhood
in late October, when three separate shootings left one man
dead and two others injured. The shootings could be part of
an escalating gang war involving a Santa Monica and a Venice
street gang, according to sources familiar with the incidents.
(“Weekend
Shootings Could Signal Gang War,” October 27, 2008)
8. The City and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)
headed on a collision course when the federal agency sued
the City after the council banned larger faster jets at Santa
Monica Airport in April. (“Jet
Ban Awaits Court Order,” April 24, 2008)
In ordering the City to suspend the ordinance approved by the council,
the FAA argued that the measure -- --which bans C and D aircraft with
approach speeds of between 139 and 191 mph -- is unnecessary and would
harm jet operators.
The City called the federal government’s challenge a “legal
assault” on an ordinance responding to increasing concerns that
soaring jet traffic -- from 4,829 jet operations in 1994 to 18,575 last
year -- is putting neighboring homes, as well as pilots, in danger.
In a brief filed in August, the City argued that the ordinance approved
by the council is legal because the City is merely trying to implement
federal runway standards.
In an effort to avoid a lengthy and costly legal battle, City and federal
aviation officials will try to settle a lawsuit out of court.
9. The long-anticipated Expo Light Rail Line from Culver City to Downtown
Santa Monica
seemed to draw nearer after LA County voters on November 4
approved a tax hike for public transit. (“Exploring
Light Rail Options,” October 14, 2008)
But the answer to key questions still remains literately up in the air
– will the rail line stay above ground after straddling Cloverfield
Boulevard or travel at street level. Will it run along Olympic Boulevard
or Colorado Avenue? And will the line take a direct route into Santa Monica,
or be diverted along Venice Boulevard before entering the city?
Whatever the decisions, one thing is clear – the line, which is
estimated to cost between $1.1 billion and $1.6 billion, will end up at
the current site of the Sears Automotive building Downtown. And it could
get there as soon as 2015. |
