In preparation for this November’s city council election, The Malibu Times will be sitting down with all five candidates vying for one of two open seats.
The order for each interview has been determined by a blind drawing, with candidate Karen Farrer picked to go fourth.
This is an abridged version of a much longer Q&A. We encourage our readers to read the text, in full, here.
Tell me about your history in Malibu. What from your past prepares you to take on this role?
I moved here, right up the street onto Rambla Pacifico, in 1978 as a college student at UCLA, got married, moved to the La Costa area, had three children along the way. I’ve been on Point Dume for the last 27 years and, from the time my oldest daughter—who’s now 32 years old—started school, I began volunteering. I got involved in the community through our local public schools and I got more and more involved as I went on. I ended up holding many volunteer roles, organizing, running events, running programs, executive positions and it led me to the realization, with another core group, that the only way we could make our schools the best possible that they could be, would be to get out of SMMUSD and have a locally controlled school district. Through that process, which I’m still involved in, is how I cut my political teeth with bureaucracy that does not have Malibu’s best interest at heart. That affects the whole community, not just people with kids in school.
What convinced you that now is the right time to throw your hat in the ring for city council and not, for instance, the Santa Monica-Malibu School Board?
Now is the right time for me.
Malibu has no guarantee of any school board member—not one seat out of the seven. I think it’s entirely predictable that Malibu won’t have more than one member. And we have the best possible person from Malibu on the school board right now, so it doesn’t make sense to me to run and put Craig Foster’s seat at risk, possibly risking any Malibu seat whatsoever by dividing the vote. I fully support Craig Foster in his reelection bid right now.
Are you concerned that voters might see you as a single-issue candidate?
Not so much. If I were a single-issue candidate, I probably would run for school board.
I’ve lived here for 40 years. The issues that I see happening and that we’ve been talking about at all the candidates forums, and all of my neighborhood events, have touched on public safety, environmental preservation, the threats that we face from agencies like the MRCA, issues that we’re dealing with with the state, with the county, the federal government, FEMA; so, no. I don’t consider myself a single-issue candidate; I hope others don’t either.
With Council Member Laura Rosenthal being termed out, she put out a call for women candidates to throw their hats in the ring. Do you feel there’s more pressure on you and Olivia Damavandi as female candidates for that reason?
That thought has never crossed my mind. For me personally, I don’t vote for anybody because of their demographic—gender, ethnicity, age—I vote for the person who I think is the best qualified, the most committed. Someone who has the work ethic. I would not ask for anybody to vote for me because I’m a woman and, again, I wouldn’t vote for anybody for that reason.
So, you mentioned in your campaign material that you are a member of Safe Access Malibu. Can you describe a little bit about what that is, and how that separates you as a candidate?
Safe Access Malibu is, right now, a grassroots, unofficial organization. It doesn’t have nonprofit status. Safe Access Malibu is a group of neighbors who started meeting a few months ago in response to, specifically, the Puerco Canyon proposed campground put forth by the MRCA.
Safe Access Malibu has been working to foster communication between different neighborhoods that have been, or are going to be, impacted by the MRCA. If you look on the MRCA website, there are a lot of things that I agree with: protection and preservation of the environment, education of the public on environmental resources, and I support that 100 percent. What I do not support is putting the residents of Malibu at risk for fire, for public health hazards.
It seems like throughout Malibu’s history, the city has been dealing with outside agencies. That’s sort of the story of Malibu. Do you think, overall, there’s a more efficient way to do that or is it really just sort of an uphill battle the city is always going to be fighting?
Personally, I’ve learned that complacency and going along with the status quo doesn’t serve us, the Malibu community. So, is there a more efficient way? I hope so. A group like Safe Access Malibu, a group like AMPS, groups that unite the community, do the research, educate the public—when there are people who are able to get deep into the trench and do that work of historical research, legal research—like I said, you don’t want to reinvent the wheel neighborhood-by-neighborhood or issue-by-issue. So, yeah, I guess the efficiency comes from people who are willing to dig in, paid or unpaid, and advocate.
The groups you mentioned aren’t affiliated with the City of Malibu. As a council member, do you think that’s something that should be brought under the fold or should it just be that these groups sprout up organically?
We live in a need-based world. When community members identify needs and are willing to fight for them, I certainly wouldn’t want the city to get in the way of that. There are a lot of grassroots organizations here and other places that do very important work and at some point they usually become official. The city gets involved out of necessity.
Perfect example: the school district. Another perfect example: via Escondido/Sycamore. The city has gotten involved when those grassroots organizations has requested and/or demanded more ammunition.
“Preserving Malibu” is a main bullet point on your campaign website. That sounds a lot like the platform of Rick [Mullen], Skylar [Peak] and Jefferson [“Zuma Jay” Wagner], the slate that ran two years ago. Do you see yourself aligned with them from a slow-growth perspective?
I think everybody agrees we don’t need more retail here. There’s a lot of empty retail space, so that doesn’t look to me like a philosophical difference between anybody on council and anybody running.
Bluffs Park has been brought up repeatedly and the city’s in a whole new conversation now with the three properties that were recently purchased from the Malibu Bay Co. Those three properties are all commercially zoned and the previous conversation and the previous surveys that were done regarding recreational facilities being built at the bluffs—as far as I’m concerned, that conversation is finished. The bluffs needs to be protected for many reasons.
So, that’s the first thing for me, it’s 100 percent off the table.
If I’m elected I will absolutely push for as much community involvement as possible on how [the city’s other properties] can be best used. I’d like to see as much community involvement as possible on what really serves local residents.
Residential development? The concept of neighborhood character is subjective, so I don’t want to see the city get into unnecessary legal battles due to subjective interpretations for residential building. I don’t see how residential projects with no variances are not only being put before the Planning Commission, but sent by the Planning Commission back to the council. If people have got $200,000, $300,000 into a residential project, and two to three years, before a shovel ever hits the ground—which has happened—we may find ourselves in the position that only billionaires will be attempting to build homes here, and I would hate to see that happen.
What do you feel is the No. 1 issue facing Malibu today, and how do you plan to tackle it?
I would like to see an increase in public safety resources on the highway.
I realize that our sheriff contract is the largest line item in the budget; I’d like to see it increased. And I would like to see as much support as possible for the volunteers on patrol.
At one time, we had three VOP vehicles; right now we’re down to two. I would like to see not only the third car reinstated, but a fourth car. The VOPs are able to do something that normally the sheriff would otherwise do.
The other thing is, they generate revenue for the city. The VOPs are able to write parking tickets everywhere except on Pacific Coast Highway. Last year, they generated $700,000. The two cars cost us $30,000 each, so there’s every reason to put resources into the VOPs.