🌟 Santa Monica Weekly with Councilmember Lana Negrete

📅 May 11, 2026

Dear Santa Monica,

Our family business, Santa Monica Music Center, was just named Business of the Year for California's 24th Senate District. My dad and my uncle opened those doors in 1972. My dad is not here to see this one, but if you stood at the back of Tongva Park this past Saturday and watched families spread out blankets for a free jazz concert, you would have felt him. I did. The store is over 50 years old. The music has not stopped. I am traveling to Sacramento on Wednesday to accept the recognition, and I am bringing his joy and love for music with me.

A lot happened in our city this past week. A festival that took years to build finally landed. Public safety numbers continued to climb in the right direction. A state housing bill that could reshape our coastline kept moving. And on Tuesday at City Hall we will take up a Boards and Commissions overhaul that is bigger than it looks. Here is the honest, no-nonsense version of all of it.

🚔 Public Safety

🔹 A 311 call, a 1,000-pound cleanup, and what coordination actually looks like. Last week a resident used 311 to report an accumulation of materials behind bushes on private property at 3028 Santa Monica Boulevard. Our Homeless Support Team responded, partnered with the Homeless Liaison Program, and removed more than 1,000 pounds of cardboard, blankets, and soiled clothing. The work was on private property, which makes it harder, and it still got done within days.

→ 🎯 My take: This is the operational model we have been pushing for. A neighbor sees something, picks up the phone, and a real team with the authority and training to act follows through. That is not magic. It is staffing, coordination, and accountability. Please keep using 311 when you see something. It works.

👉 Report an Issue (311)

🔹 By the numbers, April 26 to May 2. I get asked all the time whether the safety push is working. The data this week says yes, with caveats.

→ 📊 Calls for service: 2,483 this week, up from 2,299 the prior week. Year to date we are at 44,039 calls compared to 39,056 in 2025, a 12.8% increase. Homeless-related calls accounted for 22% of calls (558 this week, 10,274 year to date).

→ 📊 Arrests: 105 this past week. Year to date we are at 1,763 arrests compared to 998 at this same point last year. That is a 76.7% year-over-year increase.

→ ⚡ Why this matters: More calls into the system mean more residents trust us to actually answer. More arrests mean we are not just rotating people through outreach without consequences when consequences are warranted. The work is not done. The trend is real.

🔹 Notable suppression and enforcement work this week.

→ 🚨 Robbery on California Avenue (200 block): A woman walking back to her hotel had her cell phone forcibly taken by two suspects. Officers detained both after a short foot pursuit and recovered the phone.

→ 🚨 Organized retail theft at Victoria's Secret on the Promenade: A suspect made off with more than $1,000 in merchandise. SMART Center resources located the vehicle, a high-risk stop on the freeway followed, and three suspects were arrested with merchandise recovered.

→ 🚨 1550 Beach Lot operation: A coordinated push by patrol, the Downtown Services Unit, K9, Criminal Investigations, Traffic, and the SMART Center produced 30 traffic stops, two DUI investigations, and four arrests for parole/probation violations.

→ 🚨 Felony hit-and-run DUI on Cloverfield and Virginia: The driver fled on foot and was located near 20th and Delaware. One occupant sustained serious but stable injuries. The driver was arrested.

→ 🚨 Felony warrant arrest, Downtown: A subject contacted on a no-sit/no-lie violation had two outstanding Pasadena Police arson warrants of $200,000 each.

→ 💡 What this means: This is what a fully staffed department working specialized deployments looks like. Every one of those outcomes required officers, dispatchers, and units working in concert. I am proud of our team.

🔹 A multi-vehicle crash with a rollover on Lincoln Boulevard. Officers responded to a six-vehicle collision involving a rollover. The SUV driver was transported with no life-threatening injuries. Open containers of alcohol and marijuana were located inside the vehicle. A reminder, gently and seriously, that nothing on Lincoln moves fast enough to be worth the risk of impairment.

🔹 A vehicle versus train at 6th and Colorado. A driver attempted a U-turn in front of an approaching train in violation of posted signs. The train had no passengers. The driver was cited. Please read the signs at our rail crossings. They are there for exactly this reason.

🔹 Fire Department: a new academy class graduates, and a new patient-care system goes live. Eight new ambulance operators just started the AO Academy and will be on rigs in time for our summer surge. The 2026 Recruit Academy concluded on Saturday May 2 with eight graduates after 16 weeks of training. And the department officially launched its new electronic patient care record system to improve documentation, billing accuracy, and ultimately patient care.

→ 🚒 My take: Our Fire Department is one of the most quietly excellent operations in this city. The academy investment, the new records system, the community outreach with the YMCA on May 1, none of that gets headlines. All of it keeps you alive on the worst day of your life.

🔹 Police and Fire Memorial, Tuesday May 12. A solemn ceremony at the Public Safety Facility honoring those we serve alongside and those we have lost. If you can attend, please do. They show up for us. We can show up for them.

🏙️ Economic Development

🔹 AB 1740: where I stand, what is moving, and what I will not budge on. I posted at length about this on Friday, so the short version here. I support a Local Coastal Plan for Santa Monica because it lets us move faster on the things our small businesses and our coastline actually need, like activating vacant spaces, outdoor dining, and improving access. I have been clear from the start that I do not support the housing-related components of the bill in their current form, because they could open the door to overdevelopment along our coast without meaningful local planning or community input. Over the past several weeks I have been working with Assemblymember Rick Zbur, a Coastal Commissioner, city leadership, and community advocates to push for amendments that better reflect Santa Monica's values.

→ 💡 What this means: Public response mattered here. Residents spoke up consistently, and that pressure shifted the conversation with those who previously publicly supported it as written.. This was never housing versus the coast. It is possible to support affordability, environmental stewardship, economic vitality, and responsible planning at the same time. The Coastal Act protects our coast in a way other states have not been able to. A Local Coastal Plan is how Santa Monica gets faster without giving up our voice.

👉 View my AB 1740 update (Instagram)

🔹 Planning Commission weighs three housing strategies tied to the Realignment Plan. At its May 6 study session, the Planning Commission discussed three housing implementation strategies: (1) focusing housing development downtown, (2) incentivizing housing along commercial boulevards in ways compatible with adjacent residential neighborhoods, and (3) maximizing the potential of city-owned sites in the downtown and Gateway Master Plan areas. The Commission was supportive of the downtown strategy and the city-owned / Gateway sites strategy, and after a robust discussion voted to remove the language related to a low-scale development incentive program along the boulevards.

→ 🎯 My take: This matters, and the boulevard piece matters most. There is a real difference between thoughtful downtown housing growth and a blanket incentive program along corridors that run right up against residential neighborhoods. The Commission's instinct to slow that piece down and require more local planning is exactly right. It is consistent with the position I have taken on AB 1740 and consistent with how I believe Santa Monica should approach housing policy in general. We can build more housing without giving up the local oversight that protects neighborhoods.

👉 View the Planning Commission agenda

🔹 Music changes everything: the inaugural Santa Monica International Jazz Festival wrapped a successful nine-day run. Curated by four-time Grammy winner Stanley Clarke, presented by BroadStage, SM Festivals, and the City, the festival ran from May 1 through May 9 across multiple venues, anchored by the centennials of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Route 66 (whose western terminus is right here at the Pier).

→ 🎷 Highlights: Hiromi's Sonicwonder opened the festival at the Orpheum on May 1. A free all-day Promenade showcase on May 3 featured eight acts including the Samohi Jazz Combo. May 8 brought the Tribute to John Coltrane at BroadStage with Isaiah Collier, Lakecia Benjamin, and the Tenor Madness ensemble. And Saturday May 9 at Tongva Park, the festival's main event, with double 2026 Grammy winner Kamasi Washington, Stanley Clarke and Friends featuring Stewart Copeland of The Police, the Miles Electric Band, and KNOWER. It was the first full-scale concert ever held at Tongva Park, and the first large-scale multi-stage music festival Santa Monica has hosted in nearly a decade.

→ 🎯 My personal take: Standing in Tongva Park on Saturday was full circle for me. For years I have pushed for bringing music back into our parks, public spaces, and Promenade through public-private partnerships and free, community-facing events. Watching families spread out for live music brought back every memory of helping my dad and my brother set up his live jazz band in the late '80s and '90s. The work of bringing music back to Santa Monica did not happen overnight. It has been a long process. We are breaking through. There is so much more coming.

👉 View my Jazz Fest reflection (Instagram)

🔹 Big Blue Bus is on track for 10 million riders for the second year running, and MODE ridership is up 42%. April brought 904,000 BBB rides, a 3% increase over April 2025. Fiscal year to date stands at 8.3 million, only 1.5% below last year, with the gap narrowing every month. Our MODE service for seniors and people with disabilities provided 5,671 rides in April and is up 42% year to date.

→ ⚡ Why this matters: Our regional transit recovery faced real headwinds at the start of this fiscal year. The fact that ridership is climbing back means residents trust the system again, and our drivers, planners, and field staff deserve the credit for keeping service reliable while that trust was rebuilt.

🔹 Big Blue Bus teams up with the Girls Gotta Eat podcast. BBB recently partnered with podcast hosts Ashley Hesseltine and Rayna Greenberg, who reach nearly 1 million Instagram followers and more than 2 million weekly podcast listeners, around their appearances at the Netflix Is a Joke comedy festival. The collaboration included an onboard photoshoot, a ride on a BBB featuring their large-format ad wrap, and direct mentions of Big Blue Bus on their April 29 and May 4 episodes.

→ 🚌 My take: This is the kind of creative outreach I love seeing. Transit marketing does not have to look the way it has always looked. Meeting new riders where they already are, in the podcasts and feeds they actually listen to, is how we keep building ridership for the long haul.

🔹 Broadway Protected Bike Lane Project is on track for June completion. The redesigned corridor from 5th to 26th Street will deliver seven-foot bike lanes along most of the route, with select narrower segments where right-of-way required it. Final striping for 9th to 26th Street begins next week. BBB Rapid 10 and Metro Routes 1 and 18 have been rerouted from Broadway to Santa Monica Boulevard between 5th and 6th. The final project removed 107 on-street parking spaces.

→ 💡 What this means: This project has been on the books since the 2011 Bike Action Plan. Finishing it is a milestone, and the parking tradeoff is real and worth being honest about. If you live or work along Broadway and the change has affected you, I want to hear from you.

🔹 New businesses choosing Santa Monica. Dol Coffee House, a Vietnamese coffee and milk tea spot, is now open at 1231 Wilshire Boulevard. A second Cotti Coffee location is in the works at Broadway and Lincoln, joining the Promenade location announced last week. And West Side Oyster Club, the latest venture from Greg and Yunnie Morena (the husband-and-wife team behind The Albright on the Pier), opens mid-June at 1355 Ocean Avenue, extending nearly 50 years of Morena family Santa Monica restaurant history onto Ocean Avenue.

→ 🏪 Why this matters to me: Every one of these is a vote of confidence. As a small-business owner myself, I know what it takes to sign a lease in this city right now. We need to keep cutting red tape, activating vacant storefronts, and making it possible for entrepreneurs to actually open their doors. That is exactly the policy direction I am pushing.

🔹 Santa Monica Farmers Market wins a competitive $85,000 USDA grant in its 45th anniversary year. Combined with the City's $40,000 match, the program will see $125,000 in additional support for marketing, farmer outreach, and consumer education across all four of our markets.

→ 🥕 My take: After 45 years, the Farmers Market is one of the most enduring community institutions this city has ever built. A federal investment of this size, in this political moment, says something about the quality of what our team has built.

🔹 Seascape magazine is back in mailboxes. The first printed edition since 2022 arrived this past week in an upgraded full-magazine format, centered on the theme "Realignment in Action." A Spanish-language version is being finalized for the coming weeks.

👉 Read Seascape online

🎓 Education

🔹 PTA Council Honorary Service Awards. This past Tuesday night the PTA Council recognized those who quietly show up for kids in our district, year after year. I was honored to receive the Elected Official Honorary Service Award for years of service to our students and community. The award means a lot to me personally, but the moments that hit hardest were watching a SMMUSD mariachi program perform that did not exist when I started volunteering in our schools two decades ago, and presenting the Special Person Award to Officer Anthony Angel, who I have known since we were teenagers. He pours his heart into our community as a dad, a coach, and a school resource officer.

→ 💡 Why I share this: Long before City Hall, PTA Council was where I first found my voice in advocacy. For more than 20 years I served in PTA roles across our schools, including as legislative rep. Back then I never imagined serving on City Council. The path mattered. So does honoring the people walking it now.

👉 View the PTA Awards post (Instagram)

🔹 People's Academy continues, and so do the school tours. This past week brought another Negrete Tour of City Hall. Students sat in Council Chambers, met the City Manager and staff, and visited New City Hall, SWIP, and the Police Department. From last week to this week the tours included Will Rogers, McKinley, Youth City Council, Franklin, SMASH, Roosevelt, and now People's Academy.

→ 🎯 My stance: This is my favorite part of the job. Most people never get to see what happens inside City Hall, and when you do not understand it, it is hard to feel like you belong. Pulling back the curtain and inviting more people to the table is the whole point.

👉 View the City Hall Tours post (Instagram)

→ 📚 Library programming this month:

• May 13 at the Main Library: book discussion of They Called Us Enemy by George Takei, his graphic memoir about being imprisoned in WWII internment camps.
• May 23 at the Main Library: Hula Fun Fest for Families, a celebration of Native Hawaiian culture.
• May 27 at the Ocean Park Branch: screening of Yellow Rose (2019), Diane Paragas's musical drama about a Filipina-American teenager pursuing country music while navigating her family's deportation.

🔹 Drop-in health insurance enrollment at the Pico Branch. Certified Enrollment Counselors from UCLA stationed themselves outside the Pico Branch Library Annex last week to help with Covered California enrollment. Nine community members got one-on-one assistance, with follow-up appointments scheduled for those who needed more time. This is exactly the kind of meet-people-where-they-are programming I want to see more of.

🏖️ Community Investments You Should Know About

🔹 The first REACH Program deliveries are out. The Renter's Energy and Cooling/Heating Program just put free electric appliances into the hands of the first 17 income-qualified renter households in Santa Monica. Each household chose two items from a catalog that includes portable heat-pump HVAC units, high-efficiency air purifiers, and portable battery storage systems. Administered by our Office of Sustainability and the Environment with implementation partners The Energy Coalition and Sustainable Works, funded by a competitive $250,000 grant from the Clean Power Alliance Innovation Fund.

→ 🎯 My stance: Seventy percent of Santa Monicans are renters. Most of our older rental buildings were not designed for the longer, hotter heat waves we now live with, and renters have fewer options than owners to make property-level changes. Programs like this matter. I know this all too well and experience it myself in my old building! Several hundred Santa Monica households are expected to receive REACH appliances over the next six months. Eligibility focuses on Clean Power Alliance customers who participate in low-income utility assistance programs, SNAP, Free or Reduced Lunch, or deed-restricted affordable housing. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis in English and Spanish.

🔹 A silver medal and a trip to Long Beach for our Westside Special Olympics athletes. More than 100 Special Olympics athletes filled the Memorial Park Gym on Saturday May 2 for the 8th Annual Westside Basketball Tournament. Our Westside team brought home a silver medal, and they are headed to the Special Olympics Southern California Summer Games on June 5 to 7 at Cal State Long Beach. The Westside program will also be represented at Summer Games in bocce, swimming, and track and field.

🔹 Take a Moment at the Annenberg Community Beach House. Nearly 75 people gathered on Saturday May 2 for Take a Moment: An Unplugged Day of Rest, built around Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith's framework of the seven types of rest. Gardening with OSE, art with Artist in Residence Seda Saar, free books courtesy of Friends of the Library, sound healing, floating fitness, harp by Nailah Hunter. The Beach House team is planning to bring it back as an annual tradition.

🔹 Preventing homelessness before it starts: a new partnership with St. Joseph Center. Our Homelessness Prevention and Intervention Division has launched a new program with the Venice-based St. Joseph Center. The Santa Monica Homelessness Prevention program provides housing-focused case management and limited financial assistance to households at imminent risk of displacement, as a bridge to our larger Flexible Financial Assistance program launching this summer.

🔹 Bike Month is here. Our Mobility Team has been at the Downtown Wednesday and Pico Saturday Farmers Markets for Bike It! Walk It! Bus It! Week, and the celebration continues through May 31 at the Sunday Main Street Farmers Market. Ride to the market, stop by the info booth, pick up a market dollar.

📅 Tuesday at City Hall: What the Council Is Taking Up

This Tuesday May 12 the Council will hold its regular meeting at 5:30 PM. A few items I want you to know about.

🔹 Restructuring our Boards and Commissions (Item 11A). First reading of an ordinance that, among other changes, would establish a new Housing and Human Services Commission and a new Restorative Justice Commission, convert the Urban Forest Task Force into a full Commission, and amend several existing commissions. The Restorative Justice Commission, in particular, represents a meaningful structural elevation from the prior Reparations Task Force, giving the work formal standing and permanence.

🔹 Santa Monica Boulevard Safety Study (Consent Item 4I). Adoption of the safety study with direction to proceed on phased implementation.

🔹 Local Roadway Safety Plan (Consent Item 4L). Adoption of the citywide plan that organizes how we approach traffic safety across the city.

👉 View the May 12 Council agenda

📅 Dates & Community Events

🔹 Monday May 11 (today): Special Council Meeting at 5:30 PM on a closed-session City Clerk recruitment item, and Landmarks Commission at 7 PM in Council Chambers.

🔹 Tuesday May 12: Council Meeting (see above) plus the Police and Fire Memorial at the Public Safety Facility.

🔹 Wednesday May 13: Pizza with the Police at SAMOHi, and the They Called Us Enemy book discussion at the Main Library. (I will be in Sacramento accepting our family business award. More on that below.)

🔹 Thursday May 14: Meet the Police at Franklin Elementary.

🔹 Saturday May 16: Montana Avenue Wellness Walk and Sidewalk Sale from 6th to 17th, all day, free, family-friendly. Fitness pop-ups, mini wellness experiences, healthy treats, and event-day deals from merchants. No RSVP needed. Montana stays open to traffic during the event, so please use crosswalks.

🔹 Saturday May 23: Hula Fun Fest for Families at the Main Library.

🔹 Tuesday May 26: Council Meeting (interim urgency ordinance for EV charging facilities expected for consideration).

🔹 Wednesday May 27: Yellow Rose screening at the Ocean Park Branch Library.

🔹 June 5–7: Special Olympics Southern California Summer Games at Cal State Long Beach, where our Westside athletes will compete.

🔹 Saturdays at the Pico Farmers Market and Sundays at the Main Street Farmers Market. I am usually at one. Come say hi. You do not need an appointment to start a conversation.

💙 All In For Santa Monica

A word about the campaign.

As you may know, I have officially announced I am running for re-election to the Santa Monica City Council in 2026. The reason is simple. The work is not done.

When I joined this Council in 2021, public safety was struggling, our small-business community was hurting, and trust in City Hall was thin. Today SMPD is fully staffed for the first time in more than 20 years. Arrests are up 76.7% year over year because we have the officers to do proactive policing again. Our Fire Department is graduating new academy classes. New restaurants are signing leases on Wilshire and Ocean Avenue. Our Library, our Farmers Market, our Jazz Festival, our People's Academy. Every one of those is a sign of a city finding its footing again.

It is also a city still working through one of the hardest stretches I have seen in more than 40 years living here. AB 1740 is unresolved. Homelessness still drives roughly one in five police calls. Our small-business community is still navigating a brutal stretch. The state will keep pushing housing decisions onto us, and I want a council that pushes back where pushing back is the right call.

That is the work I am asking for four more years to do. With the same approach I have brought every week: in easy-to-understand language, in public, with my name attached to my positions. Always honest. Always all in.

If you can support the campaign financially, the link is below. Every contribution, large or small, helps. If you would rather organize a neighborhood gathering and have me come talk to you and your neighbors directly, that is genuinely my favorite part of this whole job. Reach out anytime.

👉 Support the campaign

📱 Stay Connected

Got an issue to report? Want to make sure the city hears you?

👉 Report an Issue (311)

If you haven't already, be sure to follow me on Instagram too for behind-the-scenes updates, event highlights, and my thoughts along the way as I continue to go on this journey with you.

👉 Follow me on Instagram

🔹 Book time with me. Virtual, in-person at City Hall, or catch me at the farmers market on weekends.

👉 Book Office Hours with Councilmember Lana Negrete

🌟 Closing Thought: Transparency Is The Work

Transparency and civility are not slogans. They are how I want to lead, week in and week out, when the news is easy and when it is not.

This was a week with a lot of both. The wins were real. The harder conversations, AB 1740, housing, economic recovery, are not over. None of those have tidy answers, and all of them deserve honest ones. The only way through is together.

I am still that mom, that small-business owner, that PTA volunteer, that renter. I grew up here. I am running for this seat again because I am still all in for the place that raised me.

See you out there, Santa Monica. 💙

Together, we're building a Santa Monica that works for everyone — a city where families can thrive, businesses can grow, and community comes first.

With gratitude and determination,
Lana Negrete
Councilmember, City of Santa Monica