Re: “Open House Thursday on Freeway Signage”
Our city has done a very good job at both managing growth and limiting overdevelopment. It is not an easy task, but our stewards deserve kudos. This includes the city staff and many current and former City Council members. Because of their efforts and foresight, Culver City sits in an envious position.
Our city really can reject the type of growth that would negatively impact our quality of life. When negotiating with developers, it can resist elements of proposals that other cities would simply have to roll over and accept.
Given this, I urge our city leaders to simply say no to additional billboards (commonly renamed “creative signage” when the billboard is electronic and huge).
I believe this should be our adopted bargaining stance for both the Entertainment District by Fox Hills and for any future development. See pages 25 through 27 of the proposed development at http://goo.gl/NLd0gg.
Developers and companies want to build in Culver City. Saying no to billboards will not dissuade them to do so. It will simply help manage the growth in a way that is less detrimental to those of us already living here.
Make your opinion heard here on the city survey: http://goo.gl/Vd57kN
Keep up the good work, city leaders. Be strong when you negotiate these proposals.
Mr. McVarish may be contacted at scott.mcvarish@verizon.net
Had Mr McVarish written his letter five years ago when our local redevelopment agency (CCRDA) was receiving millions of dollars from the state annually, I would have tended to agree with him about putting more signage in our city.
But, with the statewide loss of the redevelopment funding, we no longer are receiving the millions from state each year, like we had in the past.
This leaves local taxpayer/property owners with two options: Either simply accept the extra $500,000 in annual city revenue generated by the signage or we can write even larger checks at tax time.
The plan calls for billboards (or electronic signs) on the freeway and on the sides of every building. You really want people reading flashing billboards while doing 70mph through Culver City? Many of this monlithic billboards also blare music at you. (If you have been to NY Times Square you will have experienced this sensory assault.) If I was an attorney and my client was injured due to a distracted driver reading billboards, I would immediately sue the City of Culver City and it will end up costing much more than the $500,000 pittance of revenue that allegedly will be given to the city. Every resident, both in Culver City, Playa Vista and in Westchester bluffs, should be opposed to this invasion.
Boy, I’m sure glad Laura Stuart is not a practicing attorney. She sounds like she would be one more of those lawyers in the business of filing lawsuits, just to look busy. Probably, she would be one those who runs those obnoxious commercials you see on a cable TV trying to drum up business.
Now, if there’s one thing I hate, it’s seeing those seemingly endless, repetitive advertisements: Lawyers promising to get DUIs or moving violations dismissed or if you or someone you love has died of mesothelioma, call now! You could be part of a billion dollar settlement! Yeah, right!
Ms Stuart’s suggested legal action makes me wonder if there has ever been a legitimate lawsuit upheld against a local city government for causing distracted driving by letting an advertiser legally install a billboard along the side of a road or freeway. Or was she just letting off some pent-up anger because someone does not to fully agree with her point of view and she is trying to scare readers into thinking that such a ridiculously-sounding lawsuit would ever be taken seriously by the courts.
But… when I think about it, some citizens are trying to make these billboards sound like such a divisive local issue, that, if these new signs were to be allowed in the far corner of our city, some of these anger-crazed citizens probably would look into trying to file such an absurd lawsuit.
Only in Culver City!
George Laase
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