Smoothing Business Paths, Easing Traffic Woes Among Loni Anderson’s Goals

For two years she has been rumored as a candidate for the City Council, but it was not until last year that the picture sharpened and she made up her mind about the April 8 election, says Loni Anderson.

“Within the last eight months to a year, I gave it more serious consideration,” she said.

“Because of the political climate.

“Because of what will be happening with a new City Council.

“Three of the five people on the Council will be new. We have a lot of important issues facing the city, the budget, development, traffic, the rewriting of the General Plan. All of these things will be addressed.

“There will be a new majority on the Council.”

So far, Ms. Anderson has enjoyed the rigors of campaigning, getting acquainted with residents in her first run for office.

“My interaction with the public has been very nice when I am walking the neighborhoods, hearing what people value, hearing what people like about Culver City,” she said. “ They ask, ‘Could you really do this for me.’ I’ll tell you. Being able to achieve something that would be meaningful for residents would be very satisfying to me.

“A lot of things that happen on the Council and in the city don’t necessarily affect a person’s day-to-day existence. But they are important to the city. Being able to change a street sign would be nice. I know of a street sign in Blair Hills that says ‘No Parking’ all day because of street sweeping. Clearly something is going on there. Everywhere else in town, it’s a couple hours for street sweeping. This is particularly difficult for these folks because there is a red curb on the opposite side of the street.

“Some police officers were walking with me, too. Good for them to hear about these kinds of things.

Garbage Time

“We were told about young people in Blair Hills going up to the park, having a little fun, then opening their car doors and dumping their garbage on the street before they leave the community. Incidents like that affect our quality of life. If the city can address those issues, and policing can be increased to try and discourage the littering issue, then we need to do that.

“This would be meaningful to people on their streets, and to them personally.

“Another resident was talking about graffiti and litter, not only in Blair Hills but in Los Angeles. ‘Gee,’ the person said, ‘why can’t Culver City work with the city of L.A.?’ I agreed. We should be able to work with L.A. Absolutely, I would work with people outside of our borders.

“I have said that in the Candidate Forums, especially with respect to traffic. Hearing people talk about subjects they are passionate about or concerned about is helpful. I find it satisfying to be able to help people.

Rehabilitating the General Plan

Having played a leading role last June in nudging City Hall to reconfigure its broad vision for the community (see Part I), Ms. Anderson said she is “looking forward to being a part of rewriting our General Plan. It will be a significant document going into the next decade. In that plan, we have to address traffic. Whether or not it takes into consideration regional traffic issues — which is a goal of mine — this is something we definitely need to do. Since we are just one city, we can only make a suggestion and hope there is a good response from other communities.

“I think about working with other groups that are vested in this issue. I was speaking with the former head of the Century City Chamber of Commerce. We wer talking about connectivity. The idea of being able to look at traffic as a regional issue, and then find ways to improve our connectivity in the form of shuttles or trolleys, which is a little bit different from the bus system. We could certainly look at bus lines that increase services and help residents inside, as well as outside, of Culver City.

A Boost for Business

“To have a shuttle, for example, that goes from other business hubs could be valuable to us. If we provide that service, it could help business folks get from ‘A’ to ‘B’ without hopping into their cars, individually, as long as we can do this in a way that is appealing to them.

“If we could have members of groups vested in finding solutions to come on board and help do the tweaking that needs to be done, this would be important. There may be ideas that sound great to me but that are not workable for other reasons.

“Culver City by itself cannot do much to affect the (traffic) flow. We need to work with other groups.”