How I’m voting for the environment in the Nov. 4, 2008 election.
4 seats are up for grabs on the Santa Monica City Council, and 13 people — 4 of whom are incumbents — are fighting for them.
Honestly, I think the incumbents will win — and if they do, I’m fine with it. Aside from Bob Holbrook — whose seat isn’t up this time around — I’m pretty happy with my current city councilmembers and the work they’ve been doing. That said, I wish we had more than 1 female member on our city council, and wonder if we might be better served by someone new.
With those thoughts in mind, here’s my thought process on deciding how to vote. First, I decided to vote for the two people with endorsements from both Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights and the Santa Monica Democratic Club:
>> Ken Genser, an incumbent, is running his campaign based on fighting overdevelopment, supporting education, and expanding our park system. He’s endorsed by Senator Sheila Kuehl and Assemblymember Julia Brownley.
>> Richard Bloom, an incumbent, promises to “fulfill our goal of renewable energy & water sufficiency.” He’s endorsed by Mark Gold of Heal the Bay and Terry O’Day of Environment Now.
Then I crossed off the 4 people who were easy to eliminate. These were:
>> Jon Mann: This dude — who keeps running his campaign based on his love of wifi — has never been elected since he started running for Santa Monica City Council in 1992. Still, he wrote me an email saying he’s never had a website or meet and greet due to the fact he doesn’t have money. Dude, websites are free now — and you can have people over for coffeel
>> Linda Armstrong: This woman ran in 2006 too, at which point I wrote “This computer data entry operator sez she’ll put women and children first, but she just doesn’t have any relevant experience to offer, or any details as to how she might bring about the changes she promises.” Nothing’s changed about her bid for a seat on the City Council since then.
>> John Blakely: This 25-year-old sounds super psyched to have graduated from college — so much so that he contemplated what to write for his candidate statement “for several days”!
>> Herbert Silverstein: This 77 year-old worked in finance and retired 6 years ago. That’s basically all he had to say in his candidate statement.
That left me with 7 people for 2 seats. I did the best I could to rank everyone in order of preference from the info I was able to gather — and will be voting for the top 2, unless I get info between now and then that makes me change these rankings:
>> Bobby Shriver: In his campaign, Bobby, an incumbent, focuses on his history working with the homeless and with Heal the Bay in asking for a second term. He’s endorsed by Mark Gold of Heal the Bay and the LA County Democratic Party — but is also the only incumbent running who supports Measure T.
>> Linda Piera-Avila: This Green Party member clearly walks the eco walk and has curried favor with the biking community by promising to increase bicycle ridership, safety, and awareness. However, Linda doesn’t seem to have any experience directly working with the city. She also supports Measure T, but was quick to respond to my questions regarding this issue, and diplomatically emphasized the need to move forward together, regardless of the outcome of the vote on Measure T.
>> Herb Katz: This incumbent has lots of experience working for the city he can point to, and in his campaign, credits himself for undertaking everything from traveling to DC to fight the FAA to orchestrating the purchase of Virginia Park. Herb’s against Measure T — but has also raised the ire of bicyclists, who blame him for the police crackdown against Santa Monica Critical Mass.
>> Ted Winterer: This writer, who has the endorsement of the LA County Democratic Party, has been involved with the city as a Recreation and Parks Commissioner. However, he’s also a co-author of Measure T who says he’s “running to save our city from overdevelopment and preserve its diverse beach town character.”
>> Susan Hartley: This co-founder of Treesavers and former vice chair of the Airport Commission supports Measure T and is running a campaign on fighting growth and density while supporting trees, arguing that “The City’s proposed growth, density and height need to be stopped.” I don’t agree with her on her main issues — and think there are more important things to address in the city to boot.
>> Jerry Peace Activist Rubin: This guy put nothing in his candidate statement but his phone number and website, a lot of which is still under construction but does detail the difficulties he went through to include “Peace Activist” in his name. While he’s an active member of the Santa Monica community, Jerry’s done little to secure endorsements or donations — which makes me wonder if he’ll be able to work effectively within our current political system. He’s against Measure T.
>> Michael Kovac: This small biz advisor’s short on experience or details on how he’d do what he says he’ll do — though he’s set up an interesting website — whatsantamonicawants.com — to listen to what constituents have to say. While I’m glad he’s listening, I’m uncomfortable with his seeming unwillingness to take a stand on anything, which seems like a copout…. I’m also unaware of any relevant city experience he may have.
Disagree with my rankings? Lemme know why in the comments and I may reconsider my vote.
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