Citizen Advocates
Re “Santa Monicas Need an Advocate,” Feb. 28.
It is time to fold Joseph Edmiston’s sinecure and turn off the money spigot that funds the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy. It is time to request a separate, nonprofit agency with term limits that will honestly negotiate for open space in the Santa Monicas in accordance with the act of Congress that established the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area 20 years ago. It is time to turn the management of each acquired parcel over to the National Park Service or the state Department of Parks and Recreation. It is time to create a contiguous park, not a patchwork quilt that consigns diverse plant and animal life to oblivion within the next generation.
The largest zoo and botanical garden in Los Angeles lies a few steps away from the city in a heritage chaparral forest that cleans our air and renews our spirits in the Santa Monica Mountains. It has many citizen advocates. It is time that the city’s premier newspaper began to print the authentic and complete story of those nameless and worthy individuals who have saved the mountains thus far.
JEAN E. ROSENFELD, Pacific Palisades
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