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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 13, 2011
Volume 10 Issue 285
Santa Monica Daily Press
SAMOHI HOSTS DEFENDING CHAMPS SEE PAGE 3
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THE SO VERY HOT ISSUE
Village housing project squeaks by BY ASHLEY ARCHIBALD Daily Press Staff Writer
CITY HALL The long-delayed Civic Center Village housing project narrowly skirted another stumbling block Tuesday when
three City Council members dug in their heels over a provision requested by the developer to extend the term of the land lease 50 years past its original expiration date. William Witte, president of development
company Related California, urged the change on behalf of investors who felt that the 99-year ground lease granted by City Hall for the two market-rate properties on the 1700 block of Ocean Avenue wasn’t enough.
Granting the extension would lock in financing for the project, which has been hard to secure given the climate of the real estate market and the nature of the project, SEE VILLAGE PAGE 10
Organ donors give gift of life Donate Life to push for another 20 million donors by 2012 BY ASHLEY ARCHIBALD Daily Press Staff Writer
CITYWIDE Six years ago, former Santa Monica resident Randi Swersky received a phone call that changed her life. Her kidney and liver were both failing, and she’d been struck by quadruple pneumonia. Doctors at Cedars Sinai stabilized her enough to send her home, connected to a dialysis bag. At 10 p.m. on Feb. 1, 2006, her phone rang. “The nurse called to tell me that they had a kidney and a liver and asked, ‘Do you want it?’” Swersky recalled. It was an easy question to answer. Wednesday, Donate Life California in partnership with the California Department of Motor Vehicles gathered at the DMV in Santa Monica to celebrate the 100 million Americans nationwide to register as an organ, eye and tissue donors. That accounts for approximately 40 percent of the national population. California, with 8.7 million residents enrolled in the registry, has the most donors of any state. Each donor registered represents a possibility that someone like Swersky might get the opportunity to lead healthy, normal lives that would never have been available to them before. “Today we celebrate a major milestone with 100 million registered donors,” said Charlene Zettel, the new chief executive officer of Donate Life California. Organizations like Donate Life began collecting data about registered organ donors in October 2006. At that point, there were 65 SEE DONORS PAGE 9
RECORD ATTEMPT
Daniel Archuleta daniela@smdp.com Elaine LaLanne (center), the widow of the late Jack LaLanne, takes part Wednesday in an attempt to break the Guinness World Record for the most people jumping jacks in a 24-hour period at Equinox fitness gym. The exercise was named for the late fitness pioneer.
FBI concerned for Whitey Bulger tipster DENISE LAVOIE AP Legal Affairs Writer
BOSTON A newspaper's revelation that the tipster who led the FBI to notorious gangster James "Whitey" Bulger is a former Miss
Iceland is raising concerns about her safety and whether the leak might discourage people from coming forward in other high-profile cases. In a report Sunday, The Boston Globe named Anna Bjornsdottir, who met Bulger
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and his girlfriend in Santa Monica, Calif., as the person who led the FBI to them. The 57-year-old Bjornsdottir is a former actress who starred in Noxzema shaving SEE BULGER PAGE 11
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