By Thomas D. Elias   As recently as last July, just 22 percent of Californians favored the idea of California risking a new civil war by declaring its independence from the rest of America. But […]

By Tom Elias Time and again, President Trump threatens to withhold federal grants from California cities, universities and the state itself unless they accept policies he wants to pursue, from large-scale deportation of undocumented immigrants […]

By Steven Stajich As this column wrote in late November, the City of Santa Monica is now pursuing earthquake retrofitting of buildings and homes with renewed vigor. Vigor that no doubt stems from something of […]

One of the fatal flaws of the currently evolving Downtown Community Plan is that there are no provisions for an elementary school. This is a severe problem because much of the City’s forth coming development […]

By Tom Elias For decades, a struggle has raged across America to protect young people from the negative aspects of drinking alcohol. Now, that fight has spread to newly legalized recreational marijuana, with several California […]

Architecture should grow out of its environment, not dominate it.  Paraphrasing our City Manager, “Every city has its own character and Santa Monica should not stray from its identity.” However, in the immediate future, the […]