No Room for Santa Monica Students

For the second year in a row my daughter can't get the classes she needs at
Santa Monica High School. This despite the fact that my wife diligently
worked on her schedule and left the school after registration thinking all
had been worked out.

So what happened? My sophomore daughter shows up the first day of school only to find that somebody had undone her entire schedule. The result? Improper and inappropriate scheduling. The answer? Wait until the second Tuesday of school so that things can be worked out. So, for the second year in a row she gets to waste the entire first week of school, with no guarantee things will be worked to her academic satisfaction.

Why does this happen? We are secretly told by school officials, because of
the enormous number of out of district students enrolled at Santa Monica High
School. Take them away and all children of taxpaying, Santa Monica residents
get the classes they are entitled to by living in the district. This is one
parent who resents non-taxpayers and non-residents getting precedent over our
children who are rendered worthless schedules, worthless classes towards
progress of a high school diploma and worse yet, a waste of time they can
never truly make-up.

Ron Yukelson
Santa Monica

Dear Editor,

SMRRs Living Wage Proposal is all the rage. Only the SM Chamber of
Commerce seems to oppose the program. As the chamber puts it the LWP is
anti-American for two main reasons: First, it attempts to place the
burden of supporting a few of our City's workers on a select number of
individuals (i.e. the businesses themselves), whereas the economic burden
for these poor should be placed on all City residents. And second: the
costs associated with the LWP will discourage companies from locating in
SM.

The Chamber's good government argument sounds familiar. These arguments
were raised against Rent Control when it first began to evolve in 1978.
At that time, the Chamber didn't seem to mind about good government
issues, but seemed more interested in the tenants' new found spendable
income (money that would be spent in chamber member's stores. At that
time the Chamber's ox was not being gored.)

If the chamber could live with rent control for the last 20 years, it
surely can live with the LWP at this time. The LWP should be adopted by
the City Council without any further delay. If the program needs to be
adjusted after implementation the Council can do it on the fly. It's
time that these rich businesses start sharing their wealth with their
workers, the ones that are responsible for putting money in the
businesses' pockets.

Perhaps the Council can consider a program like the Rent Control Board has,
where a business that believes it is not making a "fair return" (due to paying
a living wage) could petition the City for a wage reduction based on that
businesses specific income and expense situation. However, the burden would
be on the business to prove that it was entitled to a wage reduction order, only
after its books were thoroughly reviewed by a hearing officer. Any loss of
income due to mismanagement would not be counted in the businesses favor.

I hope the City Council will not give into political pressure of the fat
-cat business owners. Money is important, but more so for the poor than
the rich. These business are getting rich off of our city's back, and
its time that they start responsibly sharing their wealth.

Rosario Perry