July 14, 2014
Dear Supporter of SMCLC,
Santa Monica faces a historic election for City Council this November – when residents will have a chance to fundamentally change the current Council, from one where the majority largely rubber stamps a steady onslaught of high-density, traffic-clogging overdevelopment – to one that will act for residents, not developers. The scale, character and livability of our City is at stake.
From our inception in 2005, SMCLC has championed: 1) reining in rampant overdevelopment that has brought us terrible traffic and strained our infrastructure; 2) requiring that residents' concerns about development be given more weight than developers' and their lobbyists'; and 3) uncovering and objecting to council members who accept contributions from developers and then vote favorably for their pending projects.
We've spent the past month conducting in-depth interviews of serious council candidates. As a result, we strongly support three whose philosophies and actions are in synch with ours: incumbent Council member Kevin McKeown, and Planning Commissioners Sue Himmelrich and Richard McKinnon.
Kevin, Sue and Richard have been passionate about protecting Santa Monica from overdevelopment, and repeatedly sided with residents, standing up to developers, their consultants and City planning staff, in opposition to massive or poorly designed projects. Each has shown a respect for residents' quality of life and the character of Santa Monica that has lately suffered from excessive, piecemeal, and unsustainable development. Each has pledged not to take money from developers.
All three have opposed the massive Hines project at 26th Street and they all currently oppose the three proposed out-of-scale, high rise condo-hotel towers on Ocean Avenue.
Kevin, Sue and Richard are strong, ethical, hard-working, smart candidates who can win in November. Their election – joining sitting council members Ted Winterer and Tony Vazquez – would constitute a resident-friendly majority, improve City government across the board, hold the City accountable as well as control the development juggernaut.
Now we need your help to build community-wide momentum. Please do two things right away: First, make a donation to SMCLC's PAC today at http://www.smclc.net/help-effort.html. We will use these funds to counteract the heavily funded developers who will pour money into the Council race to try to confuse voters about which candidates support reasonable growth. We will provide voters with the facts.
Second, circulate this page to your neighbors and friends and ask them to join SMCLC's email list at www.smclc.net so we can keep them informed throughout the election cycle.
In the weeks to come we will be sending out more information on Kevin (www.mckeown.net), Sue (http://sueforcitycouncil.nationbuilder.com) and Richard (www.richardmckinnon.com). Take a look at their websites and if you hear of an event for them, go meet them in person!
Thanks,
Diana, Victor, Sherrill, and Jeff
