Typical of the new-found camaraderie was last Wednesday night’s low-key planning workshop in the Garden Room at the Vets Auditorium that attracted about two dozen persons, residents-activists, curious residents and full-throttle environmentalists. Participants were impressed with how smoothly supposedly opposing factions merged their concerns and interests with each other. When they broke out into separate groups, every table was assigned an exact proportion of certain types of partisans.
A Less Elaborate Vision
The objective has occupied locals and out-of-town environmental interests for most of this century. “What we want to do,” said one visitor, “is to create the same kind of attractive, comfortable, green-oriented rest spot along the creek that others have done elsewhere on the bike path. For Culver City, this will a first. We want to take into consideration the concerns that people have expressed the last few years.” Acknowledging that location is crucial, the gentleman said that by placing the way station in a non-residential area, but near the Julian Dixon Library and the campuses of three schools, one major headache will be eliminated dealing with neighbors and a significant advantage will be gained. Students at Farragut School, the Middle School and Culver City High School, and their teachers, should find the adjacent stretch of bike path an inviting, if not irresistible, setting for immersing themselves in programs about nature. Ideally, the heavily cemented target area will be brightened with drought-resistant plants and trees that should perfume the atmosphere.
The city might have attracted a larger audience if the meeting had been promoted more forthrightly than this blocky, vague headline: “An evening of assets analysis and design solution charrette.”
Not that the process was without wrinkles or a drop of disappointment. The design presented was slightly more conservative than some had envisioned.
Paying Attention
During the meeting, a woman who understands the nuances of the creek and the path recognized the collegial tone of the dialogue. “It is clear that you have heard us,” she told the two sharp and smart young women from the landscape design group who were leading the program. “This process has addressed each of our concerns, security issues, community involvement, everything we wanted to talk about,” she said. A man seated near her offered a modified version of that view. “They have heard our concerns,” he said, ” and addressed them without necessarily doing exactly what we wanted. Still, that is fine with me.”
Residents who remember the nearly three-decade reign of the retired Police Chief Ted Cooke when officers, by design, seemed to stand well apart from community members were impressed with an obvious change in policy under Chief Don Pedersen.
Two officers, including Lt. Ron Iizuka, were full participants in the meeting, not special or separate from the rest of the crowd. “They sat at the tables, and they just chimed in like regular people,” one man marveled afterward.
Looking at Police Differently
This policy reversal was preceded by an event that may have influenced the attitude of the department about this week’s meeting. One of the city’s prominent personalities invited the newly arrived Mr. Pedersen to join him in a leisurely but working stroll along the several mile-length of the Ballona Creek bike path that serenely courses through Culver City.
Security along the bike path has been a running worry for residents, but Chief Pedersen’s officers believe their recently increasing visibility will greatly reduce incidences of crime and neighbors’ fears.
