1 David Yakobson
From: Kaitlin Drisko <[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2025 10:07 AM
To: councilmtgitems
Subject: Item 16H - Preservation Equity
EXTERNAL
Dear City Council,
The Santa Monica Conservancy has enthusiastically supported the recommendations in A Place for Everyone in Santa Mania's History, Final Report from the Working Group on Social Justice/Equity in Preservation to the Santa Monica Landmarks Commission and City Council. If acted upon as a whole, the seven recommendations will give a voice to diverse groups that have not been adequately represented in the narratives we have traditionally told about Santa Monica history.
We are encouraged that the Council will consider adding Landmarks Commission Recommendations #2 and #3 for City Staff to consider options and costs for:
Text of Recommendation #2: “Ensure that landmark nominations, and/or the reports that analyze them, take a much closer look into owners and occupants of proposed landmarks to learn more about the people associated with our historic places, because it is in the people that the stories reside.” Text of Recommendation #3: “Create Santa Monica guidelines for interpretation of the City’s Landmark Designation Criteria and evaluation of historic integrity to assist applicants, decision makers, and others active in the process, and include special guidance on how to uncover and interpret the history of previously underrecognized groups.”
These recommendations also address how research and reporting can be conducted to ensure that stories and voices that have been excluded from, or misrepresented in, our current historic context nonetheless emerge and are recognized.
Your consideration of these recommendations will support creative solutions for inclusive community engagement by staff and commissioners to ensure new voices participate in the City’s Landmark program and tell their own lived stories in their own voice.
Sincerely,
Item 16-H
March 11, 2025
Item 16-H
March 11, 2025
2 Mario Fonda-Bonardi
President
Santa Monica Conservancy
Item 16-H
March 11, 2025
Item 16-H
March 11, 2025