Following residents’ longstanding concerns regarding mansionization and neighborhood character, the city is reviewing development standards in the R-1 single-family areas, which incidentally represents about one-half of our city’s total area. This led me to a […]

By Tom Elias Build 3.5 million new dwelling units by 2025 and California’s housing shortage will be solved, Gov. Gavin Newsom prescribed during his campaign last year and several times since. Dense building near transit […]

Regarding Mark Smith’s “Santa Monica Airport Runway Removal” letter in last week’s Mirror, we disagree with much of what he wrote. The excess pavement at Santa Monica Airport is not needed — Per the terms […]

Last year our article “Santa Monica Must Prepare for the Future” outlined eight important areas on which the city needed to focus, as it prepares to meet future challenges. A year later, how is the […]

“Trouble is, many millions of Californians have invested their life savings in single-family homes, which lose much of their value when high rises overlook their backyards, as Wiener’s bill would mandate,” writes Tom Elias in his latest column on SB 50. Photo: LA Metro.

With shouts of “19” echoing across the stage, the Santa Monica High School Class of 2019 flipped their tassels from right to left and exuberantly took their final steps as high school students, This was […]

Heavy machinery has started working nights on a $3.5 Million dollar project to pulverize concrete at each end of the Santa Monica Airport runway.  This project is political nonsense and the latest step in the […]

There are a host of civic benefits which need to be funded, managed and evaluated by the general public. Most people would agree that police and fire services, primary and secondary education, social security, the […]

There is little doubt the “Beat LA” cry often heard when Southern California sports teams play in other parts of America originated in the San Francisco Bay area, probably during a Dodgers-Giants series in September […]

Revisiting SMa.r.t.’s 4-year-old article on sustainability, important themes then have become critical today: In 2013, Santa Monica was named the nation’s fifth-most sustainable city according to a prominent national organization dedicated to sustainable development and […]