Sympathetic Council Waves a Red Flag — Will It Be Heeded?

Leaders Do Not Have a Choice

The problem with transitioning a community such as Culver City from a sleepy hometown to a savvy, sophisticated, strongly competitive metropolis is that some organizations resist being pulled along. They prefer to do business the way they did in the 1950s. More than quirky, cute or nostalgic, it is potentially threatening. I think back a few years to when the Culver City Democratic Club was criticized for being a parlor operation instead of being run as a business. At every meeting these days, Club Treasurer Eric Fine stands at a microphone and delivers a fairly detailed update on Democratic finances. On this 36th birthday of my oldest son, my father is approaching the on-ramp for his 92nd birthday. Someone is going to have to tell him it is time to stop driving his beloved, rusted-out car. In the name of understandable independence, twice a week, Pop airs it out. He travels short distances that are perilous to him and, as they used to say in the 1950s, fellow travelers. The advance of time brings necessary, sometimes painful, change.

Painful but Mandatory

Just as Pop must forsake his car for everyone’s health, certain parlor-style, oldtime, informal business practices must be abandoned by certain organizations before it is too late. Change, adaptation to new times, is one of the nastiest lessons of life. For those of us who value tradition and stability, guilt-riddled resistance is our instinctive response to change. In saner moments, we relent. The first City Council agenda item on Monday night was vaguely described as a “Discussion of the Culver City Sister City Committee Practices Relating to its Expenditure of Funds.” Sympathetically, the City Manager Jerry Fulwood and the City Council chose to end their inquiry early, to spare embarrassment to parties. The sensitive gesture was a screaming red flag. We shall see if it will be heeded.