1 Vernice Hankins
From: Marianne O'Donnell <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 28, 2022 1:14 PM
To: Phil Brock; Lana Negrete; Oscar de la Torre; Kristin McCowan; Christine Parra; Sue Himmelrich; Gleam Davis
Cc: David White; Attorney Mailbox; councilmtgitems
Subject: November 29th Council Meeting: Concern about Agenda - continued item 8C
EXTERNAL
Council,
I noted that the agenda for your upcoming Council Meeting dated November 29th includes continued item 8C:
Request of Councilmember Davis that the City Council direct the City Manager to contact the head of each Neighborhood Organization and Business Improvement District listed on the City's website and ask if the organization or its Board of Directors (acting as a Board) will refrain from endorsing or opposing candidates or measures in any future election. If the Neighborhood Organization or Business Improvement District will not make that commitment, then the City Manager is authorized and directed to remove that Neighborhood Organization or Business Improvement District from any listing of such organizations on the City's website and to remove any hyperlinks to the organization’s website. In addition, the City Attorney and City Manager are directed to draft a policy that states as a condition of receiving City funding any Neighborhood Organization or Business Improvement District that makes campaign endorsements must provide a disclaimer on any written campaign endorsement materials stating no public funds are used for campaign purposes and views of the organization do not necessarily reflect the views of the City of Santa Monica or any of its officials. (CONTINUED FROM 11/15/2022)
Reiterating my email comments dated November 14th:
Penalizing neighborhood organizations for exercising their right to an equal voice is discriminatory, by attempting to muzzle them when multiple other interest groups also endorse, oppose and finance candidates and measures (Chamber of Commerce, SMPD, SMFD, SMRR, Local 11, Santa Monica Forward, obscure groups from out of town, etc., to name a few; even Councilmembers.) This request by Councilmember Davis is a denial of democracy. It denies residents the right to hear their own neighborhood associations' opinion, by suggesting that neighborhood associations be canceled from official City listings, as well as their City grants.
I would like to remind the City Council, and City Hall, that residents and their associations are also stakeholders -and the most rooted- in the governance and direction of Santa Monica. They have the right to have a voice, too.
I strongly encourage the City Council to vote this request from Councilmember Davis down, and thus respect the democratic process.
Thank you for your consideration,
Marianne O'Donnell
90405
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1 Vernice Hankins
From: OZ <[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2022 12:03 PM
To: Phil Brock; Lana Negrete; Oscar de la Torre; Christine Parra; Kristin McCowan; Gleam Davis; councilmtgitems
Subject: SUPPORT 8-C: re neighborhood groups/public funding restrictions
EXTERNAL
Please stop dispensing public funding to neighborhood groups that engage in political activity! Funding for 501 (c) (3)'s is great and I support it.
501 (c) (4)'s can find plenty of grants to apply for elsewhere.
I do not wish for my tax dollars to pay for the neighborhood groups to acquire the resource that their membership is, only for the that resource to be then used by the neighborhood groups for political activity (e.g. supporting a candidate).
Regards,
Olga Zurawska
FACT: The Supreme Court has generally supported restrictions on government funding, even when those restrictions may stop or have a chilling effect on the free speech rights of recipients.
This item is a step in the right direction in that it promotes transparency and prevents conflicts of interest, and perhaps most importantly, the appearance of conflict of interest, a concept that many Santa Monicans do not seem to be familiar with.
The neighborhood groups should at a minimum include a disclaimer when making political endorsements, as proposed by the item.
The groups currently engaging in political advocacy could also consider creating an affiliated 501 (c) (3) organization to keep the different types of funding formally separate. This is quite common, e.g.
The Sierra Club has both a 501 (c) 3 and a 501 (c) 4 organizations, as does Abundant Housing LA, an organization which has been under scrutiny within the City due to the apparent conflict of interest of its Executive Director when she sat on the Santa Monica Housing Commission.
Another option is that the City could establish a policy that limits disbursing City funding to the neighborhood groups that are 501 (c) 3 organizations.
In my years of advocacy within the City I have noticed some disturbing habits and behaviors relating to the neighborhood groups and the heads of some of them. For one, the habit of the neighborhood group heads meeting monthly outside of the public view while calling themselves the “neighborhood council.” The groups claim to be representing the neighborhoods but choose to have secret Item 8.C
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2 meetings? Such a lack of transparency is a slap in the face of the community, and creates the impression of nefarious activity that the groups are not willing to share with the community – while gladly putting out the hand for public funding.
We have to also acknowledge the fact that the neighborhood groups are in fact comprised of a handful of active members, and it is rare that more than a few dozen citizens participate in their regular meetings or otherwise remain involved. I would venture to claim that most Santa Monicans are unaware of the existence of the neighborhood groups, or are disinterested in what the groups have to offer. Such lack of involvement begs the question whether the groups put in an effort to survey and respond to the community’s needs and interests, or whether they prefer to keep the involvement of residents to a minimum for one reason or another, for example to have more control over the group which in reality is tiny and therefore invites less diversity of opinion, scrutiny or demands of accountability.
As a resident who lived in Wilmont for over five years, I was never aware of the existence of a neighborhood group in my neighborhood. It was with surprise that I read on the Wilmont website a few months ago that Wilmont “represented” the interests of thousands of Santa Monicans. Is it possible to represent the interests of the residents who are unaware of the existence of the group? Is such a disconnect present in all the Santa Monica neighborhood groups? What I find troubling as well is that I have witnessed behaviors where the head of a neighborhood group acted motivated by her private interests (ego) rather than the interests of the community. Such petty, entitled and narcissistic behavior from a person who collects public funding for her group is unacceptable. I certainly do not wish for my tax dollars to support such behavior or person running a neighborhood group.
I am flabbergasted by some of the neighborhood groups bringing up free speech when opposing this item, as I am aware of instances where the same neighborhood groups engaged in suppressing free speech in the chats during their ostensibly public zoom meetings, and gave a hard time to participants with dissenting views, all while collecting public funding for the group’s activities.
It is my view that the City would be wise examining closely what legal or fiscal relationship, if any, it would like to have with the neighborhood groups as they exist now, and the neighborhood groups would be wise to examine their goals and commitments to the community rather than the handful of people who sit on their boards, and their private interests. A truly ambitious group would not be hung up on receiving funding from the City as it invariably comes with some sort of strings attached, but would instead actively work to engage as many residents is it can, and thus grow its power independently.
A political campaign endorsement by neighborhood groups, as passive/lazy a form of political advocacy as it is, if allowed by the City as a funding agency at all, should be required to be accompanied by a disclaimer distancing the endorsement from the position of the City of Santa Monica. Any policy encouraging transparency is good, especially in a small town with incestuous political relationships and an entrenched establishment fueled by corruption.
As a final note, since some of the neighborhood groups were very upset that Mayor Himmelrich promoted her ballot measure without a disclaimer that the proposed measure was not affiliated with the City of Santa Monica, they should have no problem putting a disclaimer on any of their own political endorsements as long as they receive any public funding from the City and are listed as a City-recognized group on the City website. I cannot think of a downside to being transparent.
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Olga Zurawska
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