First in a series
[img]2570|exact|Meghan Sahli-Wells. Photo, Todd Johnson.||no_popup[/img]
If Mayor Meghan Sahli-Wells, an ardent environmentalist, could condense her fervent, lone-voice opposition to the noted Carlyle Group’s elaborate plan for possibly facelifting a certain portion of the community, it would be:
“We already have a very ambitious and vital workplan for the city. This is a handful of hotels jumping to the front of the line, saying ‘Deal with my project first.’”
Further said the mayor, “it is unfair, a bad project, and I would like to spend my time (as an elected official) on the things we have already set out, as a community, to do.
“I don’t want to go through this whole process that I am convinced will be opposed (because of the signage potential) by the community.
“I have had an outpouring of thanks,” said Ms. Sahli-Wells, “from community members. They followed the (City Council) meeting on Monday and saw me being the lone voice, saying, ‘No, don’t do it. We don’t want billboards in Culver City.’ So many people have thanked me for standing strong.”
It scarcely would be hyperbolic to report that Ms. Sahli-Wells is as sternly against signs/billboards as she is against sin.
An evolving and intensely controversial plan targeting a southerly neighborhood – lately expanded to potentially include a redevelopment-style makeover — also is threatening to be the most misunderstood City Hall project in years.
Half a year after the high-profile global asset management firm the Carlyle Group descended on City Hall and was rejected in its ambitious sign-oriented bid for bringing greater visibility to the southern area of the city, an alternate scheme was floated at last Monday’s City Council meeting. Under this proposal, the Carlyle Group would effectively embrace the role of the defunct Redevelopment Agency, seeking to rehabilitate properties. The role of signage in this scheme is unclear.
City Manager John Nachbar is in charge of a process vaguely called visioning that, so far, only sketchily has been described.
(To be continued)
