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Ashley Oelsen Newsletter — August 24, 2026
🌎 Protect What You Love with Ashley Oelsen
📅 August 24, 2026
Good morning, neighbors,
Saturday afternoon, Montana Avenue belonged to the dogs. Akua and I strolled the Dog Daze of Summer celebration, ten blocks of treats, giveaways, and more wagging tails than I could count, and I left grateful for every neighbor who stopped to say hello. But this weekend held more than one story. By Saturday's end, a man had died in an officer-involved shooting in Palisades Park, and on Sunday night a robbery near the Pier ramp ended in gunfire. The written record on our coast's federal review closed at midnight Saturday, the Council returns to the dais tomorrow, and our campaign launch is Wednesday. Let's walk through all of it, the joyful and the hard, because you deserve the whole picture.
🛟 Public Safety: A Hard Weekend, Honestly Told
🔹 A life lost in Palisades Park: On Saturday, SMPD officers were interviewing witnesses about a reported domestic violence incident near the 1400 block of Ocean Avenue when, according to the department, an unrelated man armed with a knife charged at them. An officer fired, and despite emergency care from Santa Monica Fire personnel, the man later died at the hospital. The officer was not injured.
→ 🎯 My take: A life ended in one of our most beloved parks, and officers faced a terrifying moment doing their jobs. Both of those things are true, and both deserve our care. The investigation is in its earliest stages, so I will not speculate. What I will do is watch closely and expect a complete, transparent public accounting. This is exactly why civilian oversight of public safety exists, and I trust our community to insist on it with compassion for everyone involved.
🔹 Gunfire near the Pier ramp: On Sunday around 7:50 PM, a man near the Pier ramp was approached by a group attempting to rob him. During the altercation, someone produced a firearm and shot him in the leg before fleeing. Officers treated the victim at the scene, and he was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries. No arrests have been announced, and police are asking anyone with information to come forward. A summer Sunday evening at the Pier should be sunscreen and churros, not gunshots. You deserve a Pier that is safe at 7:50 PM on a Sunday, full stop, and I will be following this investigation until there are answers.
🔹 Waymo watch: Today, Monday, August 24, is the deadline for the City to file its opposition in the appeal over overnight operations at the Broadway charging lots. The appellate court's temporary stay did not erase the trial court's findings or the year of documentation Broadway families built. We stay on this one until those neighbors get a final answer.
🌊 Our Coast: The Record Is Closed, the Watch Is Not
🔹 Thank you for putting it in writing: NOAA's written comment period on the federal review of California's Coastal Management Program closed Saturday, August 22, at 11:59 PM. Two weeks ago, more than 300 of you filled a hearing room. This week, so many of you followed through on paper, and I am deeply grateful. The record now moves to NOAA, which will weigh the public's comments as it prepares its evaluation findings, and I will report back at every meaningful step. Fifty years of hard-won protections for clean water, public beach access, and the wildlife that shares this coast were built by people who paid attention. You just proved that spirit is alive and well.
👉 Learn about the federal review
🔹 Keep the momentum in the sand: If commenting felt good, come see what you helped protect. Sunday's Community Dune Walk and Beach Cleanup is the perfect next step, and the details are in Dates to Know below.
🧾 Sound Finances: A Warning Light at Santa Monica College
🔹 SMC placed on enhanced fiscal monitoring: The Daily Press reported Friday that the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges scored Santa Monica College in the at-risk category on its financial index, triggering enhanced monitoring of the college's fiscal stability. Behind the designation: three straight years of expenses exceeding revenues, a cash balance down roughly a third over that span, and a projected structural deficit of about $7.6 million in the tentative 2026-27 budget. College leadership points to cost-cutting already underway, while faculty leaders are calling for a campus-wide budget forum and a clear plan.
→ 💡 Why this matters: SMC's budget is separate from City Hall's, but the college is an anchor of our local economy and a lifeline for thousands of students, and the lesson lands squarely on our own doorstep. Deficits do not announce themselves; they accumulate quietly while nobody reads the fine print. Honest numbers early always beat painful corrections late, and that is precisely the discipline I intend to bring to every city budget you fund.
🔹 Measure twice, vote once: A Daily Press column this week examined the Council's growing pattern of special meetings called to walk back rushed decisions, most recently rescinding a tenant-protection charter amendment passed on July 14 after legal flaws surfaced. I am a renter, and I share the goal behind that measure completely: protecting tenants and the caretakers who keep loved ones housed. But a protection that cannot survive a legal challenge protects no one. Process is not red tape. It is how good intentions become durable law, and getting it right the first time is a form of respect for the people counting on you.
🐾 Why I'm Running: The Dog Who Rescued Me Back
🔹 The story behind Saturday's stroll: Years before I ever thought about a campaign, I adopted a shelter Weimaraner named Sol while I was in college, and he changed the direction of my life. He inspired The Sol Foundation, a nonprofit I founded to teach LA kids about animal welfare, kindness, and responsible pet ownership, and through that work we helped rescue and place thousands of dogs. Walking Montana Avenue on Saturday with Akua, my current Weimaraner, I kept thinking about how that work never really ends. Our shelter system has operated at or beyond capacity for years. So to everyone who fosters, adopts, volunteers, donates, or advocates, and to the staff at the Santa Monica Animal Shelter who show up for our community's animals every single day: thank you. Caring for the creatures who depend on us is not separate from caring for this city. It is the same muscle.
👉 Support the Santa Monica Animal Shelter
🤝 Community Notes
🔹 Keeping healthy meals in front of little ones: Beach Moms Child Development Center runs a food program that puts nutritious meals in front of Santa Monica's toddlers and preschoolers every day, and this week I was glad to chip in to help keep it cooking. Good nutrition is infrastructure for growing brains, and the educators doing this quiet, essential work deserve our support.
🔹 Talking shop with the people who keep our lights on: On Wednesday evening I joined the Santa Monica Chamber's gathering at the Jonathan Club for honest conversation with business owners who care deeply about this city's future. Small businesses are our employers, our sales tax base, and our sidewalk culture, and a city serious about sound finances should treat their success as a shared project, not an afterthought.
👉 Explore the Santa Monica Chamber
🐚 Dates to Know
🔹 Tuesday, August 25, 5:30 PM: City Council meets at City Hall, 1685 Main Street. If this weekend's news, the Waymo case, or anything else in this letter moved you, public comment is your microphone. Use it.
🔹 Wednesday, August 26, 6 to 9 PM: Our campaign launch fundraiser. Come meet neighbors, ask me anything, and help kick off the road to November.
🔹 Sunday, August 30: Community Dune Walk and Beach Cleanup. Meet at 799 Palisades Beach Road, with parking at Lot 8 North near 800 Pacific Coast Highway. I will lead the walk through our dune ecosystem and coastal biodiversity before we clean the beach together.
🔹 Tuesday, November 3: Election Day, 71 days from today.
💙 Join the Movement
Wednesday night is the official launch, but this campaign has been powered by neighbors from the first signature. It is funded by individual donors, not promises. The maximum contribution is $1,200 per person and $2,400 per couple, but every amount makes a difference and is deeply appreciated. And if giving is not possible right now, an hour of your time or a forwarded newsletter carries us just as far.
🌊 Onward
I said something on Instagram this week that I want to repeat here, because a weekend like this one is exactly what I meant: integrity is not something you campaign on, it is something you practice. Practicing it means celebrating the dogs on Montana Avenue and grieving a death in Palisades Park in the same breath. It means thanking you for flooding a federal docket and telling you plainly when our institutions rush their homework. If that is the kind of leadership you want on this Council, come find me Wednesday night, or bring a neighbor to the dunes on Sunday morning. Either way, I will see you out there.
💙 Ashley
