5/13/26
Our City Council is pushing for State legislation to eliminate the Coastal Commission's authority in Santa Monica, enabling Council to gift our shoreline to developers. Understandably, many oppose this anti-environmental, anti-egalitarian idea, including the Santa Monica Democratic Club and the Surfrider Foundation.
Here’s a letter from former Coastal Commission Chair, Mel Nutter, to the Los Angeles Times:
Dear Editor,
On the 50th anniversary of the enactment of the California Coastal Act,
Assemblymember Rick Zbur is carrying a bill (AB 1740) for the City of
Santa Monica. It is designed to eliminate protections at the heart of
the nation’s premier environmental coastal program. The bill would
exempt Santa Monica from protections demanded by voters in 1972 and
re-recognized by the Coastal Act of 1976.
The Coastal Act originally established a deadline of January 1980 for
all coastal cities and counties to prepare Local Coastal Programs (LCPs)
to protect coastal resources. That toothless deadline no longer exists.
Nevertheless, in the 46 years since then, Santa Monica has failed to
prepare an LCP contemplated by the law.
AB 1740 should be defeated. It provides a blueprint for other cities to
follow if they wish to eliminate Coastal Act protections. The bill
demonstrates how a city that has failed to complete an LCP can be
awarded. rather than punished, for missing a decade’s old deadline. In
effect, the bill provides an incentive for cities to avoid doing what a
deadline for the completion of LCPs required.
Mel Nutter,
Chair, California Coastal Commission
(1982-1985)
Let’s keep the pressure on to defeat this bill. Write to Senator Ben Allen now!
Senator.Allen@senate.ca.gov
