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A roomful of Malibu citizens packed the City Council chambers Monday night. Many had come to protest what they see as a very heavy-handed and ominous city code enforcement policy. They were there because they felt a regulatory noose closing in around them, because they had some contact with the code enforcement people or they were just there to show support for their neighbors.

I must tell you I think the council still doesn’t get it. It seems to have an appalling ignorance of the relationship between cause and effect. Here’s what I mean.

The council put a zoning code into law that virtually guarantees most of Malibu doesn’t conform. The idea is to downzone and upgrade the community, which is a noble purpose. Then they tell us not to worry, “You’re grandfathered.” It’s also no great secret there are lots of second units out there that serve as the low end of the Malibu rental market, and have for years.

In theory the grandfathering system should work. It should be the escape valve to protect people with unpermitted structures that were built years ago. The problem is, it doesn’t happen automatically.

It takes money to make it work, lots of money. It also takes political clout. You need a lawyer because frankly you get no respect from any city bureaucracy unless you go armed with a lawyer. You need to hire your own experts. You need to be able to sit down with the code enforcement people and work out some compromises, and then you have to have the money to make some changes and put those compromises into place. Then, if you still can’t work it out with the code enforcement people, you have to be able to pick up the phone and be on a first-name basis with your council members. That’s the way it works here in Malibu, that’s the way it works in the county of L.A., the state of California, the nation and probably most of the world.

But what happens if you don’t have the money to fight the good fight? What happens is, the system grinds you up and spits you out, and that’s just what it’s doing and just what these people are protesting.

I’ll give you a specific example. At the meeting Monday, I talked to a young woman named Debby Campbell, who is a single mom with three young children ages 13, 11 and 5 , all in Malibu schools. She rents a second unit on the Point upon which apparently there is no record of a permit. They’re fearful of being forced out, which, considering how little low- and moderate-income housing there is in Malibu, means if they have to move, they’re out of Malibu, the kids are out of local schools, and we’ve lost another family because the ante up to continue to live in Malibu has been raised.

I know the council tells us it cares, but you just have to look at its actions to see how it really feels. It knows it has a low-and moderate-income housing problem. So what does it do? It raises the penalty for nonpermit violations, so now there are heavy fines and jail to wave over people’s heads.

It also listens to its staff who of course spouts off about “health and safety” of the community. Somehow the unpermitted structure, many of which have been around for years, have suddenly become a danger.

The staff also talks about its lack of discretion as if somehow its authority to act turns them all into automatons, just following orders. This, of course, is sheer nonsense. Staff has all sorts of discretion, and if it’s uncertain, all it has to do is ask the city manager or the council for instructions. All the council has to do is act. The council made these rules and the council can unmake them or modify them, or issue a written policy as to how they’re to be enforced and not leave it all up to the discretion of the cop on the beat.

Then staff tells us it’s not really its fault because it only responds to complaints, which is a way of shifting the blame to the person making the complaint. Since staff insists it has no discretion, it insists it must act on a complaint. That also is simply untrue because staff does in fact drive around looking for violations, using binoculars, trying to ferret out the unpermitted. It also uses a system of snitches. That snitch may be your neighbor with whom you might not get along but he has an edge because he got to the enforcement people first. The rule I’ve been told is, apparently, whoever gets to the code enforcement people first wins.

Who rents those second unit places? It’s the single moms, it’s the waiter, the kid who works at MacDonalds, it’s someone’s kid back home after a divorce, it’s the new writer looking for a break and many other blue-collar and working stiffs and crafts people who apparently are no longer welcome in Malibu unless the council does something about it.

I do not know Barbra Streisand and James Brolin. But I work in the theatre, film and television. From my own experience and from what I have been told by my fellow workers, I know the worry and fear that being followed — or “stalked” — can cause.

Sometimes, hard though it may be for some noncelebrity Malibuites to imagine, that worry and fear is horribly justified. Being followed is no joke. Being followed can be fatal.

Mr. and Mrs. Brolin did exactly the right thing in notifying the police of their pursuer.

Yes, the young man only had a camera in his hand. But what if there were a gun in his pocket? John Lennon’s sweet-faced young murderer had “Catcher in the Rye” in his hand and a gun in his pocket. After only a week, have we already forgotten the violent attack on George Harrison by another young man?

I worked with a talented young woman, Rebecca Shaefer, on “My Sister Sam,” a television show. She opened her door one weekend and was shot by a man who had hounded her for over a year.

My older son, a musician, was stalked for a year and a half by a young man who, when finally arrested by police, was institutionalized as insane and psychotic. My younger son, an actor, was stalked for many months by a man who waited for him at his car, wrote obsessively, spied on him, unseen, during my son’s work hours. He was warned off finally by the theater staff.

To be sighted in a well-known person’s rear-view mirror, hot on his/her trail, is enough to justifiably set off warning alarms in their heads.

The father and lawyer of Wendell Wall should tell him that in today’s climate of violence, notoriety engenders caution. Above all, they should remind young Wendell of a primary American credo: the right to privacy.

Nan Martin

I enjoy going to the smaller live theaters on the Westside. I have seen wonderful productions — dramas, comedies and musicals — in West Los Angeles, Venice, Santa Monica and Pacific Palisades. I did see one fine production in the newly opened theater here in Malibu, but there is no sign of more productions. I am puzzled and disappointed.

Can’t Malibu meet the competition?

Bob Sullivan

At this date there is only one public beach in Malibu (Sycamore State Beach), and a portion of a second beach, which allow citizens to visit the coast with their dogs. Leo Carrillo State Beach offers the western-most cutoff beach to dogs on leashes. Last month that section of the beach was further restricted. The park service, by its own admission, posted no signs and made no public announcements stating this new restriction. Yet in December they began selectively and randomly registering dog owner’s license numbers into their database and issuing warnings for a regulation which was not at all posted.

The California State Park system’s restrictions are getting so out of hand that there is barely anywhere left where the hundreds of thousands of tax-paying Southern California citizens who are guardians of dogs can enjoy their coast. Every day as I drive along PCH in Malibu, and every weekend when I go to any one of Malibu’s many beaches which do not allow dogs, I see countless dog owners out on the beach with their dogs. I often observe more people with dogs than without, even at beaches which do not allow dogs. There is obviously a great need and demand for public beaches which allow dogs in Malibu. And in the meantime, the park service needs to begin to fairly and honestly patrol the beaches and issue warnings.

I urge all of the thousands of dog owners in Malibu and, for that matter, all dog owners who would like to visit state beaches with their dogs, to write to the Sector Superintendent, Mr. Hayden Sohm, at 39996 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, CA 90265. Please register your voice with the State Parks System. So many of you already expressed your desire to enjoy the beach with your dogs by your actions; you will soon be receiving warnings and fines if you haven’t already. Nothing will change if you don’t express to the California State Parks System that you have a right to enjoy Malibu’s beaches, as all citizens do.

Valerie A. Thorp

I heard an anti-Proposition 26 radio ad that made me smile. And think of Spam. Two actors were portraying a misguided man and his PTA neighbor lady. The PTA neighbor lady was persuading the man to vote against Prop 26, the measure that says 51 percent of voters must vote for a school bond instead of the current two-thirds requirement. She told him that if he voted for the measure, his taxes could double. That’s when I smiled.

I was reminded of my days in the D.A.’s office, when my trial opponent would regale the jury with something — anything! — other than the facts. “If you vote to acquit my client, loathsome Spam will finally be outlawed!” That’s when I knew I’d won the case. I simply pointed out the reason my opponent was concocting Spam: He knew if the jury focused on the facts, they’d see truth and justice were on my side, not his

The argument that if Proposition 26 passes, taxes could double is classic Spam. Obviously, voters could choose to pass any number of laws by a simple majority. We could vote to wear underwear on our heads every day except Saturday. But would we? Would 51 percent of us vote to double our taxes? Would 2 percent of us?

Anti-Proposition 26 forces do not trust the majority to vote responsibly. That is why they want their own power to remain undiluted. Right now, 35 percent of the people have a more powerful voice than a 65 percent majority who may believe in improving education. Moreover, anti-Proposition 26 forces view the two-thirds requirement as an effective way to silence the voice of renters. Since property taxes are paid by homeowners and not renters, the two-thirds requirement allows a small group of property owners to render null and void the wishes of the majority — a majority consisting of both renters and property owners. Now, there may be many good reasons to vote against a particular school bond (I have voted against several), but the majority should prevail on what those reasons are, not a minority.

Personally, I want the children who grow up to be my doctor, the electrician wiring my house and the teller at my bank, to have the best education a majority of voters feel they can afford to provide. California spends on its students less than 42 other states and has earned itself the sad distinction of going from one of the best public education systems in the country to one of the absolute worst. We can now proudly say we’re down there with Mississippi and Louisiana. Except, that unlike those two states, we have a cornucopia of kids with different languages and cultures and a system with more kids in it than some states’ entire populations.

With globalization and technological advances requiring a steep, upward spiral of knowledge and sophistication from our children, now is the time to re-examine whether we should make it easier to respond to children’s changing educational needs. It may be true that for 100 years we’ve had a two-thirds bond measure standard. It is also true that 100 years ago, most children never went to college, were destined to be farmers, factory workers or hold other jobs requiring only limited skills and most girls were going to end up full-time housewives. One hundred years ago, women still did not have the right to vote, schools were legally segregated and most colleges did not admit women or blacks. Looking backwards 100 years to set the standard for a new millennium’s education system is perhaps not the most prudent course of action.

Changing the requirement for school bonds from two-thirds to simple majority merely brings education issues into line with every other voting issue. It is a question of justice for children; is it fair or right that they have to fight harder than anybody else to be heard in this democracy? It is a question of intelligently planning for the future of this country who should be allowed to make decisions about the wisest and best way to raise our leaders and citizens: the majority or minority of voters?

If Proposition 26 passes, taxes will not double, any more than if Proposition 26 passes, Spam will be outlawed. The two simply have nothing to do with each other. Though the voting populace might be tempted to feel its intelligence insulted by the anti-Proposition 26 forces, the better way to look at it is to be thankful they have made it easier to us to know which way to vote. Instead of presenting voters with good reasons why the majority in a democracy should not rule, they wildly waved Spam in our faces. They are telling us that truth and justice are on the side of Proposition 26.

By the way, the woman in the radio ad seemed to be an actress, paid to pretend to be a PTA neighbor lady and property owner against Proposition 26. In the real world, California’s state PTA Association endorses Proposition 26. I am one of those real PTA neighbor ladies, the PTA president of Webster Elementary School and a property owner. Twice in the three years I’ve been a PTA board member, with Santa Monica/Malibu’s Proposition X and now Proposition 26, I’ve diverted my attention from children’s education towards preventing a minority from imposing their apathy and/or antipathy towards public education upon the majority. I’d rather give all my volunteer time to making kids’ schools enriching places to learn and grow. And that’s no Spam.

Deirdre Roney

Your “news analysis” last week of the Jan. 15 meeting residents held regarding the code enforcement issue on Point Dume was more than a little skewed. You stated that the “meeting got off to a rocky start” when I “showed up and began to debate with some of the attendees.”

For your information, I did not attend or participate in that meeting. I’ve suggested before that you verify your information before you publish it — we’re in the phone book. Your “account” of what happened made the residents holding that meeting appear very rude — and that they were not. Your credibility deteriorates every time you print something like this. I suggest you find more informed informants.

Walt received a notice of the meeting by fax. He could not attend because the council was interviewing city attorney applicants. Since he had met with several of those having code enforcement difficulties, I went over before the meeting to explain why he couldn’t be there, and to offer them copies of the Zoning Ordinance dealing with grandfathering and permitted development in the RR zone which applies to most of the Point. I spoke with Debby Purucker and offered to stay for a short time before going on to another appointment to discuss the origination of the grandfathering ordinance if she wished. She indicated she had copies of much of the original material — so I didn’t feel it was necessary to stay.

As I spoke with her, several people walked up and started talking about their code enforcement problems. Since I have no expertise with this facet of zoning I couldn’t do much but listen. These people were very polite and concerned. There was no debate, and no one asked me to leave. I have never met Paul Majors — as far as I knew Debby was going to chair the meeting. Contrary to being “clearly upset by what had transpired,” I was delighted to have an extra half hour to go to a garage sale before my 11:00 appointment.

Yes, I know – there’s an election coming.

Lucile Keller