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MONDAY
01.23.17 Volume 16 Issue 61
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Budget and City Hall expansion on tap at City Council BY MATTHEW HALL Daily Press Editor
It’s a dense agenda for the Jan. 24 City Council meeting with plans to tackle the budget, an expansion to City Hall itself and revisions to the city’s urban forest rules. The City Services Building (CSB), a proposed expansion to City Hall, occupies two slots on the agenda. First, Council will be asked to amend the Civic Center Specific Plan to acknowledge the building’s currently proposed location. “The CSB project requires an amendment to the Civic Center
Daily Press Staff Writer
Wayne Blank doesn’t pull punches when it comes to the City and plans to develop the art gallery complex Bergamot Station. “The City has been playing god over everybody here for a few years now,” Blank said from his business, Shoshana Wayne Gallery. “They haven’t made up their mind. They don’t have a real plan. It’s just hanging.” Blank is essentially breaking away from a partnership with Santa Monica that lasted more than two decades. Up until last month, Blank owned about two acres of Bergamot Station and served as landlord for the rest. On Dec. 20, he sold his portion to real estate investment firm RedCar
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Santa Monica Daily Press
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Medical collaboration to benefit Westside newborns
Specific Plan (CCSP), because the CCSP currently specifies that a 40,000 square-foot structure with an 84- foot tower should be built in a different location to accommodate the need for additional government office space,” said the staff report. “The proposed amendment would allow a building addition up to 55,000 square feet in size and 45 feet in height at the rear of City Hall. The small amount of additional building area beyond the amount requested in the project would provide a small amount of flexibility within the SEE COUNCIL PAGE 5
Wayne Blank cashes out of Bergamot Station BY KATE CAGLE
WHAT’S UP WESTSIDE ..................PAGE 2 PARK GRANT ..................................PAGE 3 LOS ANGELES POLICE PLAN ......PAGE 4 CRIME WATCH ..................................PAGE 6 KNOW BEFORE YOU GO ................PAGE 7
Properties for $35 million dollars. As far as the rest of the galleries on the City-owned side, Blank’s lease is up at the end of the year. He says he’ll only remain if things stay the same and his lease gets renewed, but the status quo has been on the precipice of change for years. “They had the best art community going of any place in the United States,” Blank said.“This was a pretty solid community that lasted for 24 years until the City started getting involved. In the end, the City can’t get out of it’s own way.” Santa Monica purchased 5.6 acres of Bergamot Station in 1989 with transit funds. The idea was that the site could provide a source of revenue for the Big Blue Bus (BBB). A few years later, Blank
MS Epi, MBA, and Neonatologist Roxanne Arcinue, MD, interim medical director at PSJ.
BY MARINA ANDALON Daily Press Staff Writer
After recently being named one of the best children’s hospitals in the state, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) is teaming up with Saint John’s Providence Health & Services to expand the level of care available locally. The partnership began Jan. 1, with hopes it will bring additional care to Santa Monica and the surrounding communities within the Westside. Much of the medical attention will go towards the most fragile humans there are, the newborns in the medical center’s Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). Providence Saint John’s Health Center has served Santa Monica and Westside communities since 1942. The facility prides itself on the quality of care in the NICU and its Maria
Shriver Nursery, staffed by trained nurses 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Newborns with special medical needs are transferred to the Irene Dunne Guild Level III NICU to receive medical treatment and additional attention. The 18-bed Irene Dunne Guild NICU at Providence Saint John’s will be lead by CHLA Medical Group neonatologists Philippe Friedlich, MD, MS Epi, MBA, and Steven Chin, Regional Director of Neonatology and CHLA Division of Neonatology, MD, MMSc. Throughout the collaboration the CHLA Medical Group specialists will collaborate with Saint John’s physicians, nurses and therapists to advance the health center’s neonatal care. Together their mission is to provide access to SEE NEWBORNS PAGE 6
SEE BERGAMOT PAGE 5
Gary Limjap (310) 586-0339 In today’s real estate climate ...
Experience counts! garylimjap@gmail.com www.garylimjap.com
Courtesy Photo
NICU: L-R - CHLA Neonatologist Steven Chin, MD, MMSc, CHLA Neonatologist Philippe Friedlich, MD,
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