I thought I would see what was going on with this “Zoning Thing”, so I tuned in to the Council Meeting. It was on the agenda at a mercifully early hour. The fees to be imposed on single family properties to mitigate traffic was moved to a later hour, which ended up being covered at about 11:00 PM… I know, right, imposing unprecedented fees in the wake of a disastrous pandemic seems punitive and it doesn’t make much sense. But, hey, nothing much makes sense with this council crew.
Anyway, the zoning thing really gets me upset, or emotional, as the Mayor likes to put it. It went pretty much as I expected, socialism based on false premises generating mind numbing reems of reports, solutions in search of a problem.
Essentially, this planning process or the Revision of the Master Plan, in its current configuration will fundamentally change what can be done with the lots that currently have single family homes, for example 4-8 unit housing on the lot next to your home.
In addition, the planning process includes a traffic mobility component that is heavily influenced by the Biking Lobby. It seeks to reduce the number of traffic lanes on major thoroughfares to the point of forcing people out of their cars and onto Bikes, Scooters, Roller Skates, Walking, Busses, and Trains. I liken it to the drawbridge approach to traffic mitigation, “Build a Drawbridge or set up a Roadblock and they will go around.”
On June 23, these proposals go before the Planning Commission for approval so they can be given back to staff to plan how to start this party going! With such a sweeping transformative Planning, it would seem logical to fully notify those affected.
Several aspects of notification were discussed in addition to Mr. Vera’s point that the residents he comes in contact with have no idea what is happening or understanding of the nature of these proposals. Then there was this: “We’ve got so much to consider that we don’t need to overdo it with notification on the zoning issue.”
Now this is where they surprised me! Most Councils have scrupulously advocated full notification, including the previous one, with the other mayor and biking enthusiast Meghan Sahli-Wells. This is not the case with this Council. There was significant resistance to the notification proposal.
It seemed that there was some question as to whether the most momentous changes in the City’s Master Plan, since Harry Culver, should be brought to the full attention of those exclusionary elitist residents of Culver City.
There was fear that there would be an imbalance by too much attention being drawn to this particular issue of maintaining neighborhood integrity. The implication was that the Agenda, that would overturn 100+ years of single family zoning, was more important than fully informing the resident population.
This notification being discussed pertains to a Planning Commision Meeting on June 23. This is where it gets complicated. One must note that this zoning change is a two part process;
The change requires acceptance of the proposed New Master Plan by the Planning Commission.
This acceptance by the planning commission sets in motion implementation planning to be reviewed and formally accepted by the Council sometime later this year and then it will go into effect as an update in the City Charter, i.e. Implementation.
Finally, the notification motion was finally passed with four Ayes and one Passive Aggressive Abstention. You will all be getting a postcard about the Meeting on June 23.
At this point, I was ready for a break from this madness. I proceeded to another YouTube Channel that brought me out of this Orwellian nightmare.
Richard P. Schoenbaum, D.D.S.
Culver City
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