Santa Monica
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We Love Property Management Headaches!

By Lookout Staff

March 8, 2019 -- Santa Monica residents can weigh in on the future of the city's public parks Saturday morning at a Community Open House across from City Hall.

The event -- which takes place from 10 a.m. to noon at Tongva Park -- provides interactive stations where participants can offer input, as well as food, games and live music from The Mad Alsacians.

The open house "will build on the Needs Assessment Report which highlights a brief analysis of Santa Monica's existing park system and what the community has voiced through robust outreach," City officials said.

So far, more than 2,500 people have shared their vision for the future of parks and recreation, officials said.

The open house will host five interactive stations that provide key findings from the Needs Assessment Report, case studies for turning the airport into a park, "needs and aspirations" for new and existing parks, arts and recreation programming and think tank comment cards.

Members of the Santa Monica Airport2Park Foundation said they were heartened by the results of the assessment report, which highlighted the importance of converting Santa Monica Airport (SMO) into a "Great Park."

"According to the Needs Assessment Report, fully 26 percent of all ideas received from the public for site specific parks were about expanding the existing Airport Park into the whole of the airport land," Foundation officials said.

Supporters of the park note that the City's report found that the first priority listed by the respondents was to create large-scale parks.

Some 200 acres at the municipal airport will become available when the City shuts down all aviation uses at the site on January 1, 2019, under an agreement with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

"When SMO is converted to parkland, the size of the City’s park system will more than double," Foundation officials said.

Foundation President Neil Carrey said that "once the Master Plan is adopted, the next step will be to start planning big, for the big park.”

City officials will use the assessment plan, including Saturday's public input, to develop a 20-year Parks and Recreation Master Plan.

For more information about the project click here.