Honoring Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr.        January 15, 1929 - April 4, 1968
Photo The Seattle Times

SUSAN CLOKE

Columnist, Santa Monica Mirror

The Civil Rights Movement captured the imagination of the Country.  It was 1965, the Rev. Martin Luther King, working to get voting rights for African-Americans, planned to lead a 50-mile march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama.  

It was, finally, the right time to do the right thing.  I wonder how that happens.  How is it that something intrinsically right can take so long to be possible?  The prejudice, segregation, and Jim Crow laws were always wrong.  How did they last so long?  For that matter, how did they ever begin?

Eight of us, all college students, drove in a University of San Francisco station wagon from San Francisco, California to Selma, Alabama to be part of the march.

We knew Alabama State Troopers had turned the marchers back each time they tried to cross the Pettus Bridge onto the highway to Montgomery.  Photographs of the marchers had been front-page news in papers across the country.   Now, students, teachers, religious leaders and civil rights workers, from all over the U.S., were coming to Selma to join the march, forcing the focus of the nation on the right of the marchers to proceed and on the issue of voting rights.

The trip across country was different from any other car trip I had taken in my life.  By the time we got to Texas it was clear to us that people knew who we were and many didn’t like us.  We drove straight through, stopping only when we needed to, quickly buying food in convenience stores and eating in the car.  We talked and talked - civil rights, philosophy, religion, the Vietnam War – in the way of college students everywhere. 

I talked about my father.  My family lived in Minnesota when I was in elementary school and we went to Florida for a winter vacation.  My father would hold the door for a black woman and say, ‘after you Ma’am’, he would address black men as “Sir”, he would tell a black person in a store that they were next and should go ahead.  I took it for granted.  It was just my father being his usual, polite self.  It wasn’t until I returned to the South as a young adult that I realized that his politeness defied the culture of the Jim Crow South where no white man ever held the door for a black woman and where all black people in a store waited until all white people had been served, even if those white people came in after them.  My father wasn’t a person for political action.  I never knew him to go to a rally or a meeting or write a letter to the editor.  But he was a man of personal responsibility.

After several days of driving we arrived in Selma and went to the Church that was the center of the Civil Rights movement.  We were expected and they gave us the name of the man who was going to put us up and cards that we could use for meals.  I still have my card.  It says, “Susan Cloke is a guest in Selma and is entitled to free meals.”

Our host seemed old to me, but I think that was because I was so young.  He lived alone and his house, really a cabin, was small.  He had cleaned the unpainted wood by washing the floors and walls with boiling water.  The stove was on the back porch and he had a pot of beans waiting for us.  I liked him right away for his kindness and his soft-spoken manner.  We sat on his front steps and talked with him until it was time to go back into town for the meeting at the church.

It was at the church that I first heard Rev. King speak.  I have long remembered, and thought about a particular speech, which I can’t find and so this is not an exact quote, but what he said, much more eloquently than I can, was “Morality is like a muscle.  If you don’t use it to make small decisions then, when you need it, it won’t be strong enough to do what needs to be done.  Don’t think, ‘well, I don’t have to do this right thing because it’s not important and no one will even notice I didn’t do it’ and then think you will be able to do the right thing when it is important.  That won’t work.  Do the right thing now and when you really need to act you will have the needed strength to see you through.” 

The Selma Montgomery March started at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.  The first attempt to cross the Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965, was led by John Lewis of SNCC (Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee) and Rev. Hosea Williams of SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Conference).  March 7, 1965 became known as ‘Bloody Sunday’ because Alabama State troopers beat and gassed and wounded the marchers. 

On March 21, 1965, on the third attempt, with a court order in our favor, we crossed the bridge and started for Montgomery.  On the fifth day of the march, near Montgomery, thousands of people joined with the several hundred marchers who had walked all the way.  To ‘give witness’ was the expression used.

King in his Montgomery speech said,  "I know you are asking today, “How long will it take?” Somebody's asking, “How long will prejudice blind the visions of men, darken their understanding, and drive bright-eyed wisdom from her sacred throne?”  Somebody's asking, “When will wounded justice, lying prostrate on the streets of Selma and Birmingham and communities all over the South, be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men?" Somebody's asking, "When will the radiant star of hope be plunged against the nocturnal bosom of this lonely night, plucked from weary souls with chains of fear and the manacles of death? How long will justice be crucified, and truth bear it?" I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because truth crushed to earth will rise again. “How long? Not long, because “no lie can live forever."  How long? Not long, because "you shall reap what you sow.  How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

President Johnson, responding to the Selma Montgomery March took the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to Congress with these words, “Even if we pass this bill, the battle will not be over. What happened in Selma is part of a far larger movement which reaches into every section and state of America. It is the effort of American Negroes to secure for themselves the full blessings of American life. Their cause must be our cause, too, because it is not just Negroes but really it is all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.”

Martin Luther King Jr. stood next to President Johnson as the President signed the Voting Rights Act into law on August 6, 1965.  Rev. King was the leader of the Birmingham Movement and his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” was a manifesto for the Civil Rights Movement.  He was a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He was a leader of the Civil Rights Movement, a leader of all Americans and a world leader.  He was 39 years old on April 4, 1968 when he was assassinated.

Rev. King’s message of non-violence gave people hope and inspiration. He would interweave stories from literature, from the bible and from history into his sermons on the power of non-violence to change the world.  Rev. King, in his own words, “Speak truth to evil.  Speak truth to power.  But speak without hatred.”

Hometown Hero: Barbara Stinchfield

Barbara Stinchfield
Photo by Annie Stinchfield

SUSAN CLOKE

Mirror Columnist

December 30, 2011

“I came to Santa Monica at a time of high activism in the City.  There were many ideas being discussed and many people interested in the things I was interested in: child- care advocacy, youth services and working with non-profits.  It seemed a good fit,” said Barbara Stinchfield, who will retire at the end of December from her long-term position as Director of Community and Cultural Services for the City of Santa Monica. 

Looking back on her work Stinchfield said, “I was living in Oregon and right out of graduate school, with a master’s degree in counseling, I worked on youth advocacy programs.  I worked on the founding of a shelter for runaway teenagers and the development of public alternative schools.

“When I came to Los Angeles I realized there wasn’t really a similar niche so I decided to get my MBA and that led to the job with Santa Monica.  Now that I’m retiring people keep talking about my legacy and it’s hard for me to get perspective on that idea.  What I am most proud of is that we have a strong department team and I know that when I leave there will be a smooth transition.”

She began in the Community and Neighborhood Services Division and was quickly promoted to be the manager.  It was a small division, funded by federal grants.

Soon after, the Council made a policy decision to fund non-profits doing work that furthered policy goals of promoting affordable housing construction, park improvements and the growing neighborhood associations in the City.   Monies from the General Fund were added to the federal grant monies.

“We helped OPCC (Ocean Park Community Center) fund a shelter for runaway youth and the Clare Foundation to fund a house for shelter and programs,” said Stinchfield.  “We also added a focus on human service planning activities and stewarded the writing of the Child Care Master Plan and the Youth Action Plan, working in coordination with the community.

“What started as a small division with a budget of about $600,000 grew to what it is today,  $7 million coming from grants and general funds.”

In the early 1990’s she was given the job as assistant director of Community and Cultural Services, a new department, the old division was disbanded and neighborhood services became the human services division of the new department.

Under Stinchfield’s leadership the Department developed the Open Space Element of the General Plan and the long range Parks and Recreation Master Plan. 

In the late 1990’s the then City Manager, John Jalili, appointed Stinchfield as Community and Cultural Services Director.  Sinchfield said, “my mission was to build a cohesive team with the common goal of serving Santa Monica.”

It was a time of a major building boom in capital projects.  It’s an impressive list: the Swim Center at Santa Monica College: the renovation of Douglas Park; the new children’s playground at Reed Park; the building of Airport Park and Euclid Park; the expansion of Virginia Avenue Park with a focus on a comprehensive center for the neighborhood and especially neighborhood youth; building the new promenade, bike path, parks and restrooms at the beach; the renovation of the northern part of Palisades Park; and the restoration of Miles Playhouse.

“It hasn’t always been a bed of roses,” said Stinchfield.  “For instance we thought people would be delighted to have a new park on Euclid.  But they weren’t.   We put up a tent in the parking lot to have a meeting with the neighbors, we listened to them and added community gardens and made it primarily for children.  People felt heard.

“I’m known for my frankness.  It’s gotten me into some interesting dilemmas.  People appreciate it but they sometimes wonder how I can be so frank.  It’s just an Oregonian trait.  Its something I’m known for with a chuckle.  It surprised some people, but ultimately people knew where I stood and that I would not go back on my word.

“The biggest example is the Beach House.  It’s well known that neighbors were concerned and there were many, many meetings and much hammering out of parameters.  Out of that came the settlement agreement we now live with and the neighbors are happy.

“In Santa Monica, we believe in major community participation.  My daughter, Annie, came to community meetings with me and was often the first to raise her hand.  Imagine my surprise when she told me she wanted to have a meeting at her nursery school about creating a quiet place.  But we had that meeting and today there is the Ellen Stinchfield quiet room at the Growing Place, named in honor of Annie’s grandmother.

“One indication of how I work is that I just have easy chairs and a coffee table in my office.  I did that on purpose.  I want people to feel free to come in and plop down and work things out together.  I want to listen, understand and find solutions.

 “People like to work with authentic, honest and fair people and that’s what I’ve I tried to be.  You can have technical skills, but if you don’t speak the truth when the truth needs to be spoken you’re not leaving a legacy.”

What Say You: Ocean Park Green Street Celebration

OPA Board Members at the Groundbreaking Ceremony

SUSAN CLOKE

Mirror Columnist

This past wonderfully rainy December Monday, 50 people, members of the Ocean Park community and members of City Staff, came together at the Ocean Park Library to celebrate the groundbreaking of the Ocean Park Boulevard Green Street Project.

Ocean Park Boulevard has been redesigned from Lincoln Boulevard to Neilson Way with a new, sustainable and native landscape, over one hundred new trees, wider sidewalks, new parkways, new medians, bio-swales and infiltration areas to capture, infiltrate and clean storm water, new crosswalks, bike lanes, bike racks, and new, low scale, light poles.

The initial idea for this project came from the Ocean Park community.  Neighbors remember the first meetings, almost twenty years ago, in Bob Taylor’s living room, meetings at Jane Spillar’s, meetings at Peet’s, and at OPA (Ocean Park Association). 

Bob Taylor reminded everyone that Ocean Park Boulevard had been redeveloped to accommodate the traffic that the City thought would come with planned growth at the beach when Pacific Ocean Park was built.  But widening the street divided the neighborhood and left people without a safe place to cross.  Bob said, “We have the opportunity to add modern bells and whistles to our original concept which was designed to bring the neighborhood back together.”

“It’s a gateway for Ocean Park, it puts the park back into Ocean Park Boulevard,” said Peter James, the senior planner with the City.  “This project is not solely about making Ocean Park Boulevard a better place to bike and walk and improving water quality in the Bay.  Yes, it is about sustainability and that’s important to us, but it’s fundamentally about people and their changing attitude about the role of streets in the community.

John Kaliski, the project architect, believes the project is more than the design of a street, he sees it as creating greater community.  “One of the joys of working on the Ocean Park Boulevard project is that the community wanted more before we got involved, demanded the best from us, and dogged all at the City to make sure that our collective vision is implemented. I am very hopeful that the outcome will live up to all of our expectations to bring the community physically together on foot and on bicycles, create a new sense of neighborhood identity, realize heightened sustainability with regard to storm water mitigation, and craft a street and sidewalk that is integral to people's sense of home.”

The timing is finally right, money is available for storm water capture and treatment and for supporting bicycling as transportation.  The City has made a formal commitment to sustainability.  The health of the Bay is understood to be essential to the economic health of the City.  Most importantly, protecting the health of the Bay and being a sustainable City are demands made by Santa Monicans of their government.

Santa Monica Mayor Richard Bloom summed up the sentiment of the day saying, “This project weaves together the threads of sustainability and brings together the two sides of the neighborhood that have been split for so long.”

Santa Monica City Civil Engineer Carlos Rosales estimates that construction on the Ocean Park Boulevard Complete Green Street project will begin this week.  He said, “Construction will last just over a year, and one lane of traffic will be kept moving in both directions at all times.”

As an Ocean Park resident, I’m hugely optimistic about this project at the same time I also realize it is only a piece of one street.  Success will really be measured by its use as a model.  For the health of the Bay we have to infiltrate storm water citywide and keep polluted, pathogen and chemical carrying storm water out of the Bay.  If biking is to become a reasonable mode of transportation to offset our carbon footprint we have to be able to travel throughout the city safely and comfortably.  Every tree planted improves air quality and provides shade and beauty. Planting 100 trees is fantastic, but we need a citywide tree canopy to significantly improve air quality.

For connecting neighborhoods, for making a reality of our commitment to sustainability, we need to think about our streets differently and to put the park back, not only into Ocean Park Boulevard, but into all our streets.

What Say You?

 

The Ocean Park Boulevard “Complete Green Street” project  www.SMConstructs.org/OPB.

Construction manager Arcadis U.S., Inc.  310.857.4946.

Previous column March 2009  “What Say You:  Green Streets.”   

 

Santa Monica Hometown Hero: Paul Rosenstein

Paul Rosenstein

SUSAN CLOKE

Columnist, Santa Monica Mirror

“I always think of Santa Monica as a livable and sustainable community with a slow and thoughtful approach to growth, maintaining its small scale, minimizing auto traffic, and supporting biking and walking,” said Paul Rosenstein, two-time City Council member, former Mayor, former member of the Planning Commission and of the Pier Board and one of the founders of Mid-City Neighbors.

Paul moved to Santa Monica in 1982. His day job was as an electrician. He was a member of the IBEW (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers). In 2000, when Paul finished his second Council term, he took on the more than full-time job of Political Director for the IBEW, moved on to be a national representative for the AFL-CIO and then on to work with the Coalition of Unions at Kaiser Permanente, where his job focused on improving the quality of health care. 

It was a series of demanding stints and when he retired in August 2009 he was able to turn his attention to his own neighborhood and to the City. He began going to the community meetings on the LUCE (Land Use and Circulation Element) to learn what was being planned for the future of Santa Monica.

“Overall, I was impressed with the ideas and the goals of the LUCE. At the same time the scale and the amount of development in the industrial area concerned me,” said Paul.   “I saw the City as hustling people and people in the neighborhoods as not knowing what was coming down. By that I mean that the City is in transition, many projects are being proposed, and notification is neighborhood-by-neighborhood, project-by-project, but only to those who live within a 500-foot radius of the proposed project. So lots of people who will live with project impacts are not notified. There is no requirement for citywide notification even though the cumulative effect of the many projects currently being considered will be citywide.

“I saw this as a problem when I was on the Council,” Paul said. “At that time, I had proposed that the larger the project the wider the notification area should be. But the idea to expand the notification rules was not adopted and it continues to be an issue.”

“When I began to figure out the scope of what was coming, I got up at the LUCE meeting at Virginia Avenue Park and asked why we were encouraging more commercial development as there are already several thousands of people working in the City who get caught, daily, in backed up traffic on the 10 (Freeway),” he said. “I asked if it wouldn’t make more sense to build housing so people who worked here could live here.

“By the way, to make it sexy, commercial development in the industrial district was renamed as creative arts office space. It sounds idyllic and sounds like a lot of small businesses, supported by neighborhood uses such as cafes and coffee shops, really it is a lot of commercial development that will bring an excessive amount of traffic into Santa Monica.”

Paul said the LUCE goal of no net new traffic was good.  “I feel very strange raising all these traffic issues because that is the issue for the anti-growth people and I’m not anti-growth, but I am for being reasonable,” he said. “I also want us to look carefully at the Civic Auditorium development. There’s an advantage to remembering past promises. The parking structure on Fourth St. was built to replace the parking slated to be lost when the civic center lot was planned to become Civic Auditorium Park. But that park has dropped off the planning table. And the company that has the contract to develop the Civic has insisted on a minimum of 100 spaces adjacent to the auditorium. What happened here?”

Paul has lived in Santa Monica for 29 years. His parents lived here and were active members of the community. He is married to Ada Hollie, an educator and a member of the Santa Monica City College Emeritus College Executive Council.

Paul was at the first meeting of Mid-City neighbors and spent 14 years getting to know the City through his neighborhood activism and his public service. What he calls, “learning the ropes.” “Through these experiences I learned how to build consensus,” he said. “It can be difficult to make decisions where there are competing issues, and there is usually more than one side to any issue, but the community must be able to have a say in the protection of the city. I support the goals of the LUCE but want to help make sure we don’t kill the golden goose.”

Now, Paul, once again, is offering to serve on the City Planning Commission. He has submitted his application to the Council for their consideration and, he hopes, approval.  His willingness to serve and his understanding of the community will make his voice an important addition to the Commission. Paul speaks for many Santa Monicans when he says, “Santa Monica is an urban village, having the benefits of a village and the amenities of an urban environment and that’s what I want to protect and promote.”

What Say You? Qualified Applicants Need Not Apply

SUSAN CLOKE

Columnist, Santa Monica Mirror

November 17, 2011

Qualified applicants need not apply is the take home message for many Santa Monicans who follow City Hall actions.  In the last few months the City has lost Hank Koening and Gwynne Pugh, two Santa Monica architects who served on the Planning Commission; Architectural Review Board Chair and architect Michael Folonis; Landscape Architect and Recreation and Parks Commissioner Dryden Helgoe; and Arts Commissioners Jan Williamson of 18th Street Arts Center and Asuka Hisa of the Santa Monica Museum of Art.

This unhappy rash of resignations began this summer with Gwynne Pugh responsibly seeking City Attorney advice regarding a Request for Proposals for an Urban Design project and whether or not he could apply to be considered.  Although he appropriately sought advice he anticipated being told that he could apply and that if he should be awarded the contract he would be required to recuse himself from voting and completely distance himself from participating in any City or Commission discussion of the matter.  This is the requirement under the Political Reform Act and has been the typical practice of the City.

However there is another State Law, specific to contracts, State Government Code Section 1090. (Sec. 1090) City Attorney Marsha Moutrie describes the law as “harsh, narrow and deep.”  It prohibits Board or Commission Members from participating in any City contract.  If there is a violation, the action of the Body becomes nullified and the entire contract becomes void.  Further, it is a felony and could result in incarceration.

The City Council, on June 21, 2011, heard the staff report regarding Sec. 1090, listened to public comment and, concerned by the possibility of serious consequences for the City and all parties to any contract under the jurisdiction of Section 1090, directed Staff to prepare prohibition guidelines for the City and to ensure that all Board and Commission Members and applicants were notified.  In Mayor Richard Bloom’s words, “I don’t want this to be a trap for the unwary.”

As this point, you may, understandably, be asking, “What changed?  Is this a new law?”  No, the law is not new.  What has changed is that the City of Santa Monica had entered into only a handful of Development Agreements (DA) in the past and a DA is a contract.  Sec. 1090 is specific to contracts.

Previously, development projects, including major projects, would be heard in a public review process under one of the many mechanisms in the Planning and Zoning Code such as a Conditional Use Permit or a Variance Application, a Site Plan Application, or a Specific Plan.  You get the idea – there are many tools in the Planning approval toolbox.  None of these tools is a contract. Now there are 14 major projects in the DA queue in Santa Monica and each DA is a separate contract.

The Civic Center Housing Village, the Miramar Hotel, the new downtown Cineplex, Bergamot Transit Village, to name just a few, are all in the DA queue. And all are major projects that cannot help but have a considerable impact on the scale and character of Santa Monica.

The result of Sec. 1090 is that architects and landscape architects, commissioners who bring professional training and expertise to the table, are allowed to serve on Boards and Commissions when the standard planning tools are used.  When a DA is being considered the conflicts laws regarding contracts prevail and the architect’s knowledge and perspective would no longer be heard on the Boards and Commissions.

The exception to this would be to find an experienced, professional architect or landscape architect who wanted to volunteer to serve on a Board or Commission and was not interested now, and who would agree not to be interested for the term of his or her appointment, in the biggest and most interesting architecture jobs in the City.

Don’t get me wrong here.  We need many different perspectives on our Boards and Commissions and the broadest representation of the City possible.   We need voices of neighbors and community leaders and more. But we all lose when professional voices are not at the table.

Additionally, there is an influential timing element.  As just about everyone in Santa Monica knows, the City has recently completed an extensive public process of writing a new Land Use and Circulation Element, called the LUCE.  The LUCE has been approved and now the Zoning Code must be conformed to the LUCE, a difficult and demanding task.  Planning Director David Martin estimates June of 2012 for a first draft ready to be ready for public review with final approval around the beginning of 2013.

In the interim between the passage of the LUCE and the adoption of the conformed Zoning Code many developers have chosen, or been advised by the City, to use the DA process.  The terms of the DA contract are required to be negotiated in public.  A kicker to this issue, but one to keep in mind, is that, because the DA is a contract, it can establish terms that are outside the LUCE. 

That brings us back, full circle, to the fact that the much needed expertise it will take to understand the architecture, design and land use issues being considered is not able to be at the table because the DA is a contract.

If you got this far you can see the conundrum for the City. Marsha Moutrie said, “this body of law in Section 1090 has costs for the City in terms of our ability to ensure that very well qualified people serve on our Boards and Commissions.  At the same time, this body of law preserves the public trust in government.”

In an important case regarding Sec. 1090, Thompson v. Call (1985), the Judge wrote, “The truism that a person cannot serve two masters simultaneously finds expression in California's statutory doctrine that no public official shall be financially interested in any contract made by that person or by any body or board of which he or she is a member.”  It’s hard to argue with that.

Is there a solution in sight?  One that preserves public trust, respects the law and includes the much-needed voice of experts on our Boards and Commissions.  One possibility may be to look at the cumulative environmental impacts of the 14 large development projects, all proposed to be developed in a relatively short time frame, and consider whether it would be prudent to slow down and space out the projects to lessen the construction and traffic impacts on residents, businesses and visitors.  The City would be able to so because cumulative impacts are considered under the required Environmental Review.

Doing so could mean that many, or even most, of the Development Agreements being considered might reasonably be processed using other planning mechanisms.   In that event the DA could become the exception rather than the rule and the many and highly qualified design professionals who have been such able volunteers in the service of the City could again participate in the City dialogue as Board and Commission members. 

The positives would be a lower level of disruption and congestion from the proposed developments and a higher level of public service from the many, highly talented design professionals that we are fortunate live in the City.  The negatives are that a slower timetable may create hardships for developers and for the people depending on them for income, employment, business, and the other opportunities that good development can bring.

The future scale and character of the City will be decided by these projects.  I say it’s worth discussing all alternatives and looking for the best way to continue to have all voices at the table.  We saw how important it was to the LUCE process to include the voices of design professionals.  Let’s not lose them now.

What Say You?

Contact Susan Cloke

susan@smmirror.com

Hometown Heroes: Suffragists

Meetings in public parks, speaking from makeshift platforms, using the media to get the word out - sound familiar? In 2011 it’s “Occupy Wall Street.” In 1911 it was “Votes for Women.” Different goals define each historical issue. The one constant is that, to change the status quo, people have to speak out in a major voice. 

Ms. Magazine wrote about the California suffragists, “No one could say that suffrage supporters hadn’t tried, or become overconfident and quit too soon. During the year they had overcome rain and mud, then heat and dust on the state’s primitive roads to stage debates or give speeches to even the smallest, most remote audiences. They held giant rallies–one in Los Angeles on Sept. 30, 1911 was so well-attended that hundreds were turned away after 5,000 jammed Temple Auditorium and overflowed into Choral Hall. The suffrage effort had garnered support from labor, prominent citizens, newspapers and even a few politicians, and it had matched anti-suffragists ad for ad in the newspapers. On the day of the special election, supporters began assembling at 4 a.m. to go out and stand as near as the law allowed to each polling place to give out literature to the undecided. Cars flying “Votes for Women” pennants were kept busy all day carrying sympathetic voters–all men, of course–to the polls. They rode past many blocks on which there was almost a solid yellow line of suffrage banners hung from houses, telegraph and telephone poles, and anything else to which they could be nailed or tied.”

Celebrating the extraordinary work and the success of the California suffragists, the fact that California has elected women to every level of government and is represented in the United States Senate by Senator Diane Feinstein and Senator Barbara Boxer, more than 150 people filled the auditorium of the Santa Monica Bay Woman’s Club to honor the work of the past, to acknowledge the gift to us, and to think about our responsibility to the future. 

Greeted by club members dressed as suffragists, and eating donuts with “Votes For Women” tags, an idea taken from photos of the 1911 rallies, the audience learned, from speeches by UCLA Professor Ellen DuBois, Librarian Virginia Elwood-Akers, and the Martha Wheelock and Jane Guthrie film, “California Women Win the Vote,” exactly how difficult it was, how much work it took, to pass the 1911 amendment to the California Constitution that made California the sixth state with women’s suffrage.

California was already ahead of the rest of the country on the issue of equality. In 1878 the California Constitution was amended, adding the following, contemporary-sounding language, “A person may not be disqualified from entering or pursuing a business, profession, vocation, or employment because of sex, race, creed, color, or national or ethnic origin.” (Article 1 Section 28); “No person shall be debarred admission to any department of the university on account of race, religion, ethnic heritage, or sex.” (Article 9). California women could go to the university and they could work, but they didn’t have the right to vote.

The 1911 election was a cliffhanger. It took several days for the vote to be tallied and victory to be declared. Initial returns had shown defeat, especially in San Francisco, and newspapers had headlined the defeat. In Los Angeles it passed by a narrow margin. According to Joanne Leavitt, President of the League of Women Voters of Santa Monica, the vote for suffrage in Santa Monica was 414 for and 361 against. The Evening Outlook, which had come out in favor of votes for women, took for itself the right of registering the first female voter in Santa Monica.

The California journalist and suffragist, Alice Park, in telling of the narrow victory, famously said on the day the final vote was tallied and the suffragists were victorious, “…. men stopped me on the street to congratulate me. Everybody seemed to approve…. No man can be found who voted no. They must have died the same day.”

The history of the Woman’s Clubs is intertwined with the story of suffrage.  Originally started to provide women a place to learn and study as well as a place to participate in civic life, they became an essential part of the movement for women’s suffrage in America.  

The Santa Monica Bay Woman’s Club was formed in 1905 and included Georgina Jones and other prominent Santa Monica women in their roster.  Its first president, Elmira Stephens, is listed on the rosters of national committees organized to support suffrage. With help, in the form of a land donation from Santa Monica founder, Arcadia Bandini, the Santa Monica Woman’s Club purchased the 4th Street property and the Club is still in the same, now historic, building. Jessica Hankey, a current Woman’s Club member and officer, sees the Santa Monica Bay Woman’s Club as “a tremendous resource that has survived for over 100 years and is here now for the community.”

In the words of one of the SaMoHi students who attended the celebration, “What can we do at this point to get things moving toward full equality?” 

And really, isn’t that the right question for each generation to ask?

What Say You? Adoption Of The Urban Forest Master Plan Moves Closer

Imagine a city known for its trees. One with every tree well filled and every tree cared for. Trees that provide habitat for the birds of the Pacific Flyway, clean the air through their own natural processes, infiltrate storm water to protect the Bay, offer shelter, provide shade, establish a sense of place, and are intrinsically beautiful.

That’s what the DRAFT Urban Forest Master Plan (the Plan) envisions. The Plan, or a modified version of it, is expected to be adopted at the City Council meeting of Dec. 13, 2011. The Plan has been two years in the making, the product of the Urban Forest Task Force and an extensive public process.

The City’s urban forest started with the beginning of the City, with Arcadia Bandini’s gift of Palisades Park. Trees were planted as the City grew. The City Beautification Program of the 1950s created a citywide tree-planting plan and focused on tree planting. The Urban Forest Master Plan is a continuation of the work of all the people who gave the City our existing public trees. 

The “right tree in the right place” is the motto of the Urban Forest Task Force. That can be as simple as making sure the tree well is the right size for the tree to reach its full growth, provide shade, and maybe even produce fruit. 

Santa Monicans attended hearings and listed goals and concerns regarding “aesthetics, sustainability, water conservation, species diversity, the use of native trees, enhancing a walkable City, enhancing public transportation stops, expanding parkways, tree maintenance, planting fruit trees and creating public orchards.” They cited the environmental and aesthetic benefits of trees and stated an overall preference for large canopy, evergreen, flowering trees.

Criteria for tree selection were established by the Task Force and include measuring each tree for the environmental benefits of improving air quality, protecting the Santa Monica Bay through the infiltration of storm water, providing shade for people walking and bicycling, and offering habitat. 

Criteria can be complex and are sometimes competing. One criterion is the use of native trees because they grow well and provide habitat. Another criterion is the protection of iconic trees – trees that provide identity and character for a neighborhood. 

An example of the iconic function of trees can be seen on Georgina, Margarita and 19th Streets with rows of palms that are integral to the history of the neighborhoods. The trees create a sense of place and are highly valued by the residents of those streets.

Final review before City Council action on the Plan began with The Landmarks Commission meeting of Oct. 10, 2011. The Commission expressed concern, in the words of Commissioner Bach “that the Plan establish clear criteria for the enhancement and protection of areas with trees having historic and cultural significance.” The Commissioners also discussed the importance of the right street tree for each Historic District and recommended Historic District species selection should express the historic era of the District.  

The next step is the meeting of the Task Force on the Environment on Oct. 17. Expect them to review the environmental benefits and goals of the plan in the context of the Santa Monica Bay Watershed, the essential benefit of using tree wells as an opportunity to: infiltrate storm water and intercept and store rainfall thereby keeping pollutants out of the Santa Monica Bay and protecting marine life; reduce soil erosion; and provide habitat, especially for the birds on the Pacific Flyway which include the Northern Mocking Bird, Anna’s Hummingbird, the House Finch, and the Snowy Plover.

The final public hearing, before going to Council in December, will be at the Recreation and Parks Commission on Oct. 20. Look to the Commission for a review of tree selection criteria and tree species diversity, process and criteria for determining tree selection and tree removal, inclusion of specimen trees in the public landscape, trees and public health, tree canopy for protection of walkers, joggers and cyclists, and the implementation of freeway tree planting – a “freeway forest.”

“There are currently 33,800 public trees of 250 different species in Santa Monica,” said Randy Little, Public Landscape Manager for the City of Santa Monica. “We plan to plant 1700 new trees by June of 2013. Costs can vary widely, but the average cost for a new tree to be planted is about $400.00 and that includes the removal of the dead and/or diseased tree that is to be replaced.”

It is a practical and thorough plan. It sets the base for the ongoing oversight of the Urban Forest and calls for “exemplary stewardship of the forest from all who live and work here.”  

It is the community of Santa Monica and their willingness to be the stewards of the forest that will determine the success of the urban forest and give us now, and Santa Monicans to come, the right tree in the right place at the right time.

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