Category: Op-eds

My opinion pieces.

  • Full Speed Ahead on Policy, Still Stuck in Traffic

    Pasadena has ambitious plans for changing how we travel. But are we solving the transportation problems we already have?

    Anyone who regularly drives along California Boulevard knows what happens when the Metro train comes through. Traffic comes to a standstill, sometimes backing up all the way to Los Robles Avenue. Drivers sit and wait for the train to pass before traffic can begin moving again. This is hardly news to anyone who drives in Pasadena, but here’s why it bothers me:

    Pasadena is pursuing a $75.1 million roadway project along Pasadena Avenue and St. John Avenue. That’s quite an investment. Proposed improvements include better sidewalks, upgraded traffic signals and intersections, lighting, landscaping, and bicycle facilities.

    The money to fund this project was originally part of a $230.5 million Metro Measure R allocation meant to separate the train tracks from vehicle traffic at California Boulevard. That plan never came to fruition because preliminary estimates showed just how expensive and disruptive the construction would be. I understand why Pasadena walked away from it.

    But finding a less expensive alternative was never supposed to mean giving up on fixing the traffic problem. I fought hard to make those railroad crossings a priority because I knew how frustrating they were for residents. In September 2022, I wrote to City Council asking why improvements to the crossings ranked sixth on their list of priorities while the $75.1 million Pasadena Avenue and St. John Avenue project came first. I honestly believed residents would be outraged to learn that addressing such an obvious, everyday problem wasn’t the city’s first priority.

    Ultimately, Pasadena set aside $2.5 million in 2023 to improve traffic monitoring and signal coordination along the Metro A Line, with equipment planned for up to 18 intersections. But when I recently asked the Transportation Department about progress on that project, I learned that it is still in what the city calls the “pre-design” phase. The city is preparing to hire a consultant, and it doesn’t expect to award a contract until the first half of 2027. Only then will the design phase begin. More than three and a half years after the funding was approved, we’re still waiting for the actual design work to start. Meanwhile, we are still stuck in traffic.

    Pasadena is moving ahead with its $75.1 million Pasadena Avenue and St. John Avenue project, with public meetings scheduled for October 29 and November 4. Shouldn’t we understand whether the railroad-crossing improvements will help traffic before making decisions that could send more cars onto surrounding streets? And when will those railroad-crossing improvements finally be installed? Asking for a friend.

    I’d love to see Pasadena Avenue and St. John Avenue looking better, with improved sidewalks, more trees, and attractive landscaping. Those streets could certainly use it. But City Hall seems more interested in putting its transportation policies into practice than fixing the problems we’re already dealing with.

    It’s no secret Pasadena wants more people to walk, bike, and take public transportation more often. But when did implementing these policies become more important than fixing the traffic problems right in front of us?

    I sometimes wonder how many Pasadena residents realize just how much emphasis City Hall has placed on bicycle transportation. Beyond the $75.1 million Pasadena Avenue and St. John Avenue project, there’s another $12.6 million for Greenways along four north-south streets and $9.9 million for improvements along Columbia Street. That’s nearly $100 million in roadway projects that include bicycle infrastructure, with even more transportation planning underway.

    Those who use bicycles in Pasadena want safer streets; I can understand that. But what about everyone else trying to get around Pasadena? According to the city’s own transit plan, 97% of residents live in households with at least one vehicle. And just ask any current resident who’s tried to get from one side of Pasadena to the other lately; traffic is a problem. When we’re talking about $75.1 million, shouldn’t we be asking whether we’re spending it on the problems that need our attention most?

    Before we spend this kind of money, I’d like to know how many bicycles actually use the Union Street Protected Bikeway and how many cars sit and wait at our most congested intersections. I’d also like the city to explain what we’re expecting to accomplish with these significant Metro investments and how we’ll know if they’re working. Is that really asking too much?

    In a December 2024 article, Pasadena transportation planner Scott Johnson wrote that the project would “encourage traffic to use other arterial corridors, such as Fair Oaks Avenue and Arroyo Parkway.” That caught my attention. Shouldn’t we have the $2.5 million traffic-monitoring system up and running before encouraging more cars onto those streets? We need to understand how traffic is moving today so we can measure what happens when the roadway changes are made. Surely that should be part of planning a $75 million project. Otherwise, how will we know whether we’re improving traffic or making the backups at the railroad crossings even worse?

    These aren’t just numbers on a traffic study. They affect our everyday lives. We use our cars to drive kids to school, run them to soccer practice, take our parents to appointments, pick up groceries, and try to get to work on time. Cars have been part of life here for generations. After all, historic Route 66 ran right down Colorado Boulevard! We can encourage people to change their transportation habits, but expecting our dependence on cars to disappear overnight simply because City Hall has adopted new policies? It’s just unrealistic.

    We seem to have an extraordinary commitment to changing how people travel in the future, while some of the most obvious transportation problems affecting Pasadena today remain unresolved.

    Mayor Gordo acknowledged this reality during the October 14 Housing, Homelessness and Planning Committee meeting. He asked when he might realistically be able to give up his car and acknowledged it could be a long time. He also questioned the practicality of riding a bicycle up North Lake Avenue carrying groceries, particularly for senior citizens.

    I was glad to hear him say it. Because, like it or not, a lot of us aren’t giving up our cars anytime soon or even in our lifetime.

    And that’s why I keep questioning our priorities. What good is another transportation plan like the Pasadena Avenue and St. John Avenue Roadway Network Project if we’re still sitting at the same intersections, waiting for traffic to move? Before Pasadena spends millions redesigning how we travel tomorrow, has it done enough to fix how we travel today?

    If you’ve ever sat through the traffic at California Boulevard, you know why this matters. I’ve created a One-Click letter asking Pasadena City Council to count the bikes, count the cars, and show residents how these projects could affect our streets before the plans get too far along.

  • Are We Becoming Santa Monica?

    Protect what makes Pasadena special before we lose it.

    For years, I’ve had this nagging feeling that Pasadena is becoming more like Santa Monica—or, more broadly, like the Westside. Pasadena has always been different from Santa Monica in many ways—warmer climate, slower pace, historical character, and old-school charm. Frankly, Pasadena has been much easier to get around too. You would never confuse one city for the other. Yet over time, I’ve started to notice something the two cities increasingly share: policy choices that are chipping away at the ease and success that have long made Pasadena such a good place to live.

    The first policy that really caught my attention was the heavy emphasis on housing around transit. It seemed that Pasadena prioritized the number of units over the quality of what was being built—less character, less open space, trees in concrete pots, and buildings that could easily be mistaken for ones in Santa Monica, Culver City, or anywhere else. And this is in a city that takes pride in its architecture.

    Along with the new housing comes reduced parking. New projects are being planned with fewer spaces, based on the idea that residents will drive less if they live near transit and use the metro or bikes. For example, the proposed project at 2000 E. Colorado Boulevard includes 144 apartments but only 64 parking spaces. To state the obvious, many residents still need a car to function. Pasadena residents drive across town for school, soccer, groceries, and doctor visits. People aren’t organizing their lives around a rail line or bike lane—they base their routines on where their kids, jobs, doctors, and errands are.

    As part of the push to get people out of their cars, Pasadena has added bike lanes throughout the city, including along Union Street and other parts of the city. I enjoy riding a bike when it makes sense—but not when I’m in a hurry, when the route feels unsafe, when the weather isn’t great, or when I have kids or groceries to carry. People decide how to get around based on what they need to do that day, not on a city goal.

    Then there’s homelessness. It was one of the first issues that drew me to City Hall. It has become much more visible, especially around businesses and parks. And more recently, it became very personal when I saw people living on the sidewalk and in the park right next to my church and its school. I believe in outreach and services, but our schools still need to operate without worrying about what’s happening outside the school gates; parents want to know their kids are safe, sidewalks should be accessible, and our parks should be places families can enjoy. We need laws and enforcement to keep our city clean, safe, and functioning.

    To be fair, Sacramento is driving many of these changes, especially around housing, transportation, and parking. But I worry that Pasadena isn’t always pushing back. In many cases, the City and its council seem to be moving in the same direction. State mandates shouldn’t end the conversation. If anything, they make it even more important for Pasadena to review the local impacts and decide where common sense can still win the day.

    The best analogy I can share for how I see this is the game of Jenga. Pull out one block, and it stays upright. Then another. Each move seems manageable alone. But eventually, the whole structure begins to wobble when too many stable blocks are removed.

    That’s what I’ve worried about in Pasadena for years—how all these newer policies will unfold once they are layered together. Will the city remain stable, or will it start to collapse like a Jenga tower?

    And Santa Monica is definitely wobbling.

    The Los Angeles Times recently asked a simple question: What happened to Santa Monica? RAND research shows some of Santa Monica’s economic struggles began before COVID. That means we can’t blame everything on the pandemic—something was already going wrong.

    As I read about Santa Monica, I kept thinking of Pasadena. The details differ, but the pattern and policies feel familiar.
    When you see how some of these policy goals are actually implemented, the trade-offs become clear. Road diets or added bus lanes can remove car lanes, turn lanes, and parking. Reduced parking requirements can make driving less convenient, with the hope that more people will switch to other climate-friendly modes. More housing can mean higher density, less open space, and fewer mountain views—changing an area’s feel in ways that may never have been intended. And a service-first approach to homelessness can still leave parks, sidewalks, and businesses dealing with trash and safety concerns, sometimes without knowing whether those who are unhoused will accept the help being offered.

    What disturbs me is what these policies seem to assume about residents—that they will drive less, need less parking, accept denser living, use transit more, and live with whatever happens in parks, next to our schools, and on our streets. Businesses are expected to adjust too.

    But if Santa Monica’s struggling downtown and retail sector are any indication, those adjustments aren’t happening smoothly. More than 11% of Santa Monica’s retail space is vacant, while Pasadena’s recent Economic Development Strategy put its citywide retail vacancy rate at about 5.5%. Pasadena is not there yet—and that is exactly why this is the time to pay attention.

    Affordability adds another layer. Pasadena’s sales tax is now 11%, with state, county, and local taxes all contributing to that total. Pasadena households and businesses are also dealing with higher utility costs. When living, shopping, and doing business become more expensive and complicated, residents and businesses can start to feel like the city is working against them rather than for them.

    This is where cities can get themselves into trouble. We become so fixated on whether policies sound good that we forget to ask what they’re actually doing to the city and its residents when they are layered together. Layer enough of them together, and the base may not be as strong as we think.

    Santa Monica is now adding police downtown, making parking easier, supporting businesses, and investing in revitalizing the Promenade. But I still don’t hear enough about whether past policy decisions contributed to the city’s current issues.

    We may not have all the answers yet, but Pasadena should want to know before making many of the same moves.
    What worries me most is that, little by little, we might start losing what makes Pasadena special—the mountain views, trees, clean parks, neighborhoods with character, and the ease of living, shopping, and getting around with our kids.
    We don’t want to become Los Angeles. And sometimes, I fear that this is exactly where we are headed.

    Before Pasadena makes its next move, we should pause and assess how these changes work together—and whether the tower remains steady.
    Pasadena has the advantage of observing this elsewhere first. We should make good use of that.

    Policies should adapt to people and their lifestyles, not just lofty ideals or the latest “zero” campaign. We should be careful not to expect residents to change their lives to fit policies, but to shape policies to support a better life for residents and businesses.

    Santa Monica learned some of these lessons the hard way. Pasadena doesn’t have to.

  • Pasadena Did Not Arrive Here Without Warning

    My jaw was practically on the floor as I listened to Pasadena’s Design Commission meeting on Aug. 25. I could not believe what I was hearing. Two thoughts kept running through my mind: We are creating a city that may fail when it comes to transportation and we are tragically proposing and approving apartments where children may never see the sun or have a tree to sit under. And somehow we are calling this progress.

    Thankfully, commissioners were finally questioning the lack of meaningful open space, extremely small units, limited daylight, trees and parking, and whether the housing being built would offer families a reasonable quality of life. But what truly floored me was hearing the word “tenements” used by Design Commission Chair Julianna Delgado during a preliminary discussion of a proposed 144-unit, 100% affordable housing project at 2000 E. Colorado Blvd.
    “It’s almost like we’re building a whole system of tenements,” Delgado said. “So we went for hundreds of years trying to get away from that, and now we have people stuffed in to give them a roof over their head. But life is more than just that.”

    She then observed that people living in historic tenements “at least had a robust street life,” something she noted does not exist along this portion of Colorado Boulevard, and where I personally only see cars whizzing by, empty storefronts and a lack of any meaningful trees.

    I sat there wondering how Pasadena could get so far down this road that the chair of its own Design Commission is now comparing the emerging development pattern to tenements?
    It was Delgado who raised the evening’s most important question: “What kind of housing is it—just cramming people into little boxes or giving them a good life?”

    She is right. We have become so focused on counting units and making everything “affordable” that we have stopped considering the cost. What kind of life will people actually have inside these apartments? The trade-off we are making as a city and state, putting aside our values simply to fit more people within our borders, is a detriment to those we are seeking to house.

    Commissioner Marie-Claude Fares supplied an even more disturbing image. She described units with living room and bedroom windows facing a blank wall only 9 feet away.
    “Putting kids in front of a blank wall in their bedrooms, never seeing the sun—that really, really, really concerns me,” she said.

    We already worry that children spend too much of their lives sitting in front of TV, computer and cellphone screens. Are we now going to build bedrooms with a forced view of blank walls, too?

    Affordable housing should not mean housing built to a lower standard of dignity, daylight, health or quality of life. Families of limited means deserve homes where children can see the sun and residents can gather outside to rest under trees that provide actual shade. These families deserve the same careful planning and high standards that Pasadena should demand for any housing.

    Delgado identified the larger issue, noting that the problem is not a single flawed project.

    “I think I’m more concerned about the pattern that we’re starting to see for acceptable design for 100% affordable projects, which is not acceptable: small units, no open space.”
    The critical word is “pattern.” This is not only about one building. It is about what Pasadena is allowing—and increasingly being required by the state—to become standard. The commission’s candor was both astonishing and encouraging to hear. Residents did not begin raising these concerns last month. I have been hammering away at these exact issues for more than a decade: trees, traffic, open space and quality of design.

    Many of us warned about approving greater density without equally serious planning for parks, open space and trees, transportation, parking, other infrastructure and the impacts to surrounding neighborhoods. We questioned whether the city was studying the cumulative consequences of all these projects.

    For raising those concerns, I and others were too often portrayed as anti-housing—and called plenty of other, far less polite names. Ask about the size of a building and you were deemed anti-housing. Ask where people would park and you simply did not understand the future of transportation or climate change. Ask whether families would have enough open space and you were standing in the way of progress. Our questions were treated as attempts to stop housing rather than legitimate concerns about how Pasadena was growing.

    Now I’m angry because commissioners are asking many of the same questions, but perhaps too late. We have arrived at the precise moment many residents like myself warned was coming.

    The discussion of parks and open space was particularly revealing. Commissioners considered whether development-related fees could help provide those amenities elsewhere. Fees may be one potential tool, but collecting money does not create open space if Pasadena has not identified and preserved land on which to provide it.

    How is the city only seriously confronting this question now, after so many projects have been approved and so much available land has already disappeared? Have we waited so long that most opportunities have already vanished?

    The parking discussion exposed the same problem. If projects are permitted to provide little or no parking, Pasadena needs real evidence about what happens afterward or what tools we have to manage such an important problem. Are the promised changes in travel behavior such as bike riding and using public transit or ride-sharing services actually occurring? Some residents may use these modes of transportation, but many still need cars to get to work, take children to school and bring home bags of groceries. Buses don’t travel to every destination.

    We have to prepare for the future based on the world as it actually is, not the one we hope might someday exist. This is exactly why planning has to come before approvals—not after the consequences become impossible to ignore. The city should study those consequences now—not wait until 2027.

    I recognize that the Design Commission’s authority is limited. Delgado acknowledged that density, height, parking and the loss of amenities through waivers and concessions are often outside the commission’s hands. But “out of our hands” cannot be where Pasadena’s response ends.

    It is also time to stop hiding behind the state’s harsh new housing requirements, which have unquestionably limited Pasadena’s authority. Our leaders should push aggressively for changes when those laws produce harmful results. Every single council member should be pounding on the state’s door and saying, “Enough. We will not stand by while Sacramento forces Pasadena to build housing that no one should have to live in.” City leaders are only as powerless as they allow themselves to be.

    Pasadena is on the verge of being transformed into a much denser city without the parks, trees, open space, transportation, parking, and infrastructure necessary to support that density. That is not progress. Every project approved without addressing those needs makes the problems harder—and perhaps eventually impossible—to correct.

    Pasadena did not arrive at this moment without warning. The writing was on the wall. Residents and commissioners finally appear to be on the same page. There is no more time to waste debating whether these problems are real. It’s time to show up and get to work—and fast. We have a city to save.

    We have a city to save. Join me in advocating.

    Check the home page for ways to show up for Pasadena!

  • Where Are Pasadena’s Great Trees?

    A visit with a 1,000-year-old tree in Montana made me wonder why we don’t do more to celebrate Pasadena’s living landmarks.

    While visiting Seeley Lake, Montana, someone told me about Gus. I had never heard of him but knew I couldn’t leave without meeting him, which is how I found myself walking through an ancient grove looking for a tree (a 1,000-year-old western larch standing 153 feet tall and nearly 23 feet around, to be precise). According to the sign beside Gus, he has survived at least 40 fires.

    This tree wasn’t especially easy to find, tucked away in the grove along the lake. You had to know it was there and go looking. A local bartender told me the story about how an Eagle Scout’s Service Project helped identify Gus and tell his story. The visit and journey to see Gus made me think about Pasadena and the special trees we have here.

    I have always cared deeply about Pasadena’s trees. After the Eaton Fire, as the controversy over PUSD’s tree removals and remediation continues, I was pleased to see the City pushing to preserve as many mature trees as possible under Pasadena’s Tree Protection Ordinance. I have also been moved by the young people who continue to show up for the trees at their schools — protesting, speaking out and even staging tree-sits to try to save them. And despite the recent removals, it is encouraging to see PUSD now considering an ambitious goal to substantially increase the mature tree canopy on its campuses. If this controversy has demonstrated anything, it is that I am hardly alone in caring about Pasadena’s trees. A great many people in this city love them, value them and are willing to show up for them.
    But back to Gus. Standing beneath its canopy, I could almost feel its age. It was quiet and stoic. It felt as though time were standing still. It was a beautiful experience. Gus made me wonder: Where are Pasadena’s great trees?

    Pasadena has officially designated Landmark Trees, but where are they? How old are they? Who planted them? What history have they witnessed over the last century and beyond? Are there others that haven’t yet been designated? And why isn’t there an easy way for residents to discover them?

    Imagine a Great Trees of Pasadena map. Start with our Landmark Trees. Give us a photograph, location, species, approximate age, and, most importantly, the story. Let residents nominate other extraordinary trees. Perhaps create walks that encourage people to go out and see them.

    Pasadena is already asking these kinds of questions around the history of our buildings. Through Historic Places Pasadena: Completing Our Story, the city is inviting residents to identify places and stories that matter, and has created an interactive story map to help document them. Why not do the same for the history of our trees and living landmarks?

    Maybe that is where a Great Trees of Pasadena map should begin, with the trees we already love, and the stories we have not yet told.

    I know at least one: the enormous Moreton Bay Fig on Marengo Avenue between Green Street and Del Mar Blvd. With its massive base it almost looks prehistoric, but we know exactly when its story began. Thomas Earley, who would later become Pasadena’s Mayor, planted it at 170 South Marengo in 1880, six years before Pasadena incorporated.

    His house is now gone, but the tree remains.

    The next time you drive down Marengo, slow down and look for it. Better yet, stop and see it up close. Once you know its story — and stand beside that extraordinary trunk — I suspect you won’t look at it quite the same way again.

    Where are the trees that matter to you and your family? It is hard to imagine some of Pasadena’s campuses without the trees that have shaded generations of students, or some of our most beautiful streets without the canopies that define them. It’s what makes our city so unique and beautiful—a “Tree City” for all of us to be proud of and enjoy. Let’s share the experience I had with Gus and map Pasadena’s great trees. Tell your city council your favorite neighborhood tree. Let’s find Pasadena’s great trees, tell their stories and make sure the next generation knows where to find them.

    Check the home page for ways to show up for Pasadena!

  • When Zero Doesn’t Mean Zero

    Pasadena has a thing for zero. Zero Waste. Zero traffic fatalities. One hundred percent carbon-free electricity. And now “functional zero” street homelessness. Who can argue with the aspirations? We all want less waste, safer streets, cleaner energy, and fewer people living on sidewalks. But that is exactly my point: fewer is a goal. Zero is an absolute. And when zero doesn’t actually mean zero, the word begins to lose its meaning.

    Pasadena’s own Zero Waste plan is a perfect example. It calls for Zero Waste by 2040, while projecting a minimum 87 percent diversion rate. That may be a worthwhile goal. But it isn’t zero. The City Council has also adopted a goal of zero traffic fatalities by 2035, and Pasadena is pursuing 100 percent carbon-free electricity by 2030. Now, we are talking about “functional zero” homelessness.

    Pasadena’s own homelessness data says that even after helping more than 1,000 people exit homelessness into permanent housing over three years, the number of people entering homelessness continues to grow. So before announcing “zero,” shouldn’t we first ask what is realistically achievable?

    If homeless inflow continues to outpace housing, what does functional zero actually mean, and is it achievable? What number are we trying to reach if not? By when? At what cost? And how will we know whether the policy is working? No business could survive by announcing “zero” as the goal and figuring out the math later. Yet government too often does exactly that. We wouldn’t run our households that way either. Imagine raising children around a series of absolute “zero” expectations — zero mistakes, zero bad decisions, zero problems. Real life doesn’t work that way. Real life requires judgment, priorities, tradeoffs, and measurable progress.

    Our city government should work with reality, not slogans. Let’s start with a realistic goal, a clear timetable, a reasonable price tag, and regular reports showing whether we are meeting it. Let’s focus on goals we can measure and ultimately hold our government accountable for meeting them. Businesses do it, and so should our government.

    An aspiration like “zero” cannot replace a well-prepared goal, and a slogan is not a measurement. I would rather Pasadena promise “fewer” and show us the progress than promise zero and later explain why zero never really meant zero in the first place. If City Hall wants to keep promising us zero everything, then residents should insist on three things in return: accountability, fiscal discipline, and no new taxes.

    Define the goal. Show us the numbers. Report the progress. Tell us what it costs. And if reaching “zero” requires another tax, assessment, or revenue measure, that should be part of the conversation from the start — not a surprise at the end. Maybe the most important zero for residents is this one: Zero blank checks.

    Check the home page for ways to show up for Pasadena!

  • Great Cities Don’t Happen by Accident

    The first lesson I learned about being a citizen wasn’t taught in a classroom. It was taught at Pasadena City Hall by a woman who didn’t seek to teach anything, but led by example. Her name was Nina Chomsky.

    When I first began attending City Council meetings, I cared deeply about issues arising in Pasadena. I was passionate, but a novice at advocacy. I made big mistakes. At first, I suspect Nina rolled her eyes at me and assumed I was another passing voice who would come and go. But I stayed, and I learned, especially from her. Nina taught me that passion and preparation were not the same thing. She valued both and always came ready to argue her case.

    As I began to understand what being prepared meant, I started reading staff reports closely, asking questions of staff and learning how decisions were actually made from beginning to end. Over time, Nina became more than someone I would simply see at City Hall. She became a mentor and a friend. We did not always agree or view every issue through the same political lens. But Nina taught me that disagreement didn’t have to keep people from working together for a city they both loved. This was our common bond.

    She believed that being a resident of Pasadena came with responsibilities: to pay attention, learn the issues, and show up—even when the decisions at hand did not affect our own street or neighborhood. Caring about a city meant taking part in shaping its future. Her example has stayed with me, along with the question it raised: What do we, as citizens and leaders, owe the places we love?

    Because I love my city and am always looking for solutions, I keep an eye out for thoughtful writing about cities. Lately, I have found myself reading essays by a diverse range of writers and publications, each approaching the subject from a different political perspective.

    Some argue that cities thrive when government is ambitious and willing to invest in the public good. Others warn that cities decline when leaders tolerate disorder, ignore fiscal realities or pursue ideology without measuring results. Still others focus on the importance of beauty, history, civic institutions and a shared sense of belonging. 

    Indeed, these writers do not agree on everything. Together, though, they raise a question that Pasadena should be asking no matter what your political background: What makes a great city?

    A great city is compassionate, but it also understands that compassion without safety and order can fail both the people who need help and the larger community.

    A great city welcomes change, but it does not discard its history or allow development to erase the qualities that made the city special.

    A great city invests in public services, but it also asks whether programs are working and whether taxpayers can sustain them.

    It pays attention to evidence, measures results, and has the courage to change direction when a policy is not producing what was promised.

    It is also a prosperous city—one that welcomes investment while protecting the qualities that made people want to live, work and visit there in the first place. None of those qualities can be sustained by good intentions alone.

    A successful city needs businesses, jobs and a strong tax base. It also needs safe streets, beautiful public spaces, well-maintained neighborhoods, and confidence that City Hall can deliver basic services residents depend on. Those goals should not be treated as competing values or viewed through a political lens. Some crossover can occur between different priorities and approaches. For example, a city can invest in the public good while still keeping an eye on the local government’s budgetary limitations. In fact, these objectives depend on one another to achieve something great. In today’s divisive political landscape, it would be a relief to put politics aside and agree on these basic goals to build and maintain a great city.

    Pasadena did not become Pasadena by accident. Previous generations and civic-minded people protected historic buildings, planted trees, created parks and libraries, supported churches and civic institutions, and built a city known around the world. Now we are making decisions that will permanently shape Pasadena for decades. For instance, we face major changes to housing and development. We are also confronting homelessness and looming questions about public safety. We are now being taxed to fund more services like the library and potentially our fire stations, all the while residents face their own financial pressures. Our city continually responds to state mandates that increasingly limit our local control over how our city grows. These decisions and issues require more than good intentions and compassion for fellow neighbors. They require clear goals, honest numbers, and a willingness to ask whether the policies we adopt will actually produce a viable, growing and historic city we love.

    If stewardship sometimes requires respectfully challenging higher levels of government, like the state, do we have the courage to do it? And if change is inevitable, are we shaping it thoughtfully—or simply letting it happen to us?

    Great cities need elected leaders and professional staff, but they also need citizens willing to participate. They need people who read the agendas, attend the meetings, ask difficult questions, and remain involved after the immediate controversy has passed. They need neighborhood associations, churches, schools, businesses and civic organizations that understand they have a role in the life of the city.

    They also need people like Nina.  After Nina died, Pasadena Star-News Public Editor Larry Wilson wrote beautifully about her life and her devotion to Pasadena. His words reminded me how many people quietly shape a city without ever holding elected office. Nina understood that city government was something to partake and help shape. It was a practice. She showed up, and she paid attention. She expected people to do their homework. She could be tough, but her toughness came from believing that Pasadena was worth the effort.

    The city we inherited reflects the choices of people who came before us. The city we leave behind will reflect the choices we make now. It is our turn to show up, ask difficult questions, and care enough to help Pasadena become its very best. Great cities don’t happen by accident. They happen because, generation after generation, people decide their city is worth showing up for.

  • Good Public Policy Should Not Be Afraid to Be Measured

    I have been hearing a lot about parking lately. As the saying goes, you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone. When you can’t find a place to park your car it can make you late, cost more money than expected, or disrupt your plans. It’s annoying at best, and dangerous at worst.

    I keep a pretty close eye on Pasadena’s Design Commission agendas for reasons other than parking, but when a new report mentions ‘limited parking‘ within the first few sentences, it gets my attention fast. So when I started reading about 2000 East Colorado Boulevard, a six-story, 100-percent affordable housing project proposing 144 residential units and just 64 parking spaces, I was taken aback. Under new state law, Pasadena could not require the developer to provide a single parking space. The developer chose to provide 64; under the city’s pre-density-bonus parking ratios, the project would have required 189. You can’t ignore 64, but zero would be worse.

    Seeing yet another project with reduced parking raises a significant question that Pasadena’s leadership needs to answer: What is actually happening to our transportation habits and behaviors as we build more housing with less parking? Are these state driven policies having the desired effect, or are we just creating more circling, more congestion, more pressure on neighborhood streets, and more competition for the spaces that remain?

    Residents are confronting these concerns project by project, but no one in the city appears to be putting the pieces together. I have recently witnessed residents flag this issue multiple times: at a Pasadena housing committee meeting on large housing projects along Colorado Boulevard, during a discussion of a proposed seven-story apartment project on Catalina Avenue, and at the Design Commission’s consideration of the 55-and-older development at 540 South Lake Avenue.

    We understand the theories driving reduced parking requirements: Parking is expensive to build (especially underground), and policies limiting available parking are intended to encourage (or coerce) people to walk, bike, and use public transportation to help address climate issues. However, these objectives are arguable if we don’t actually get people into public transit or riding their bikes. So how do we know these policies are even working?

    Pasadena’s leadership must start asking whether these policies are producing their intended results; otherwise, we are just building our way toward a parking crisis. Wouldn’t it be appropriate to study parking demand before projects are approved and then measure what actually happens after these buildings are occupied, despite state mandates?

    Pasadena requires transportation analysis for development projects, and many projects are also subject to Transportation Demand Management measures. But those reviews do not answer the question of parking demand. We should research how many vehicles a project is likely to generate, whether the proposed parking supply meets that demand, and what happens to surrounding neighborhoods when it doesn’t. These are questions we should be asking before a project breaks ground. Then, once a new building is occupied, we should have a way to compare projected use to real use.

    I wonder: has Pasadena conducted any broader retrospective analysis of completed projects that measure actual car ownership, transit use, and parking demand? Apparently not, as Planning and Transportation have only recently started planning a workshop with the Planning Commission that would examine these things. The planned discussion may not reach the Planning Commission until winter 2027.

    As these massive developments are being approved, the need for better information on parking demand is only becoming more important, and the city’s apparent lack of urgency is concerning. To be fair, these recent state laws have reduced Pasadena’s ability to impose parking requirements on many new housing developments like the ones being proposed, but less control does not mean the city should stop asking what the consequences have been to date or what they will be in the future.

    My hope is Pasadena will quickly decide to look more closely at what happens on the streets surrounding these projects—comparing projections to real use, and use that data when considering applications for future developments or political discussions with our state representatives.

    Residents like me should not have to become traffic experts or parking planners—or raise money to hire them—to identify impacts we see on the ground. A strong city that values its residents would anticipate, measure, and address before complaints start rolling in.

    We can theoretically plan for fewer cars, but that doesn’t mean people will actually stop using them. I do hope Pasadena’s analysis ultimately shows that people living in our transit-oriented developments are choosing to forgo cars, take transit more frequently, and walk and bike more. But if studying the issue identifies unintended consequences, let’s work to acknowledge them before the problem becomes so entrenched that our choices disappear.

    My hope is the city won’t simply shrug and accept more congestion, parking problems, and a diminished quality of life for its residents as the unavoidable price of growth. Join me in encouraging the city to measure what is happening before it’s too late.

    Good public policy should not be afraid to be measured.

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  • Pasadena Is Going to Grow. We Still Have to Get It Right.

    Lately, I have had the sense that Pasadena is at a crossroads.

    Pasadena is being asked to accommodate more housing, more density and larger buildings — often for understandable reasons. At the same time, the city must protect the very qualities that make people love Pasadena: its scale, its neighborhoods, its historic buildings, its mature trees, its mountain views and the small businesses that give different parts of the city their identity.

    Residents also expect their city to work. As Pasadena grows, our streets and infrastructure need to keep pace — including making sure new development does not simply push parking and traffic into surrounding neighborhoods.

    That tension was hard to miss Tuesday night.

    There was Pie ’n Burger — small, familiar and unmistakably Pasadena — with a proposal for a building more than 60 feet tall and roughly 380 feet long rising directly behind it, a scale so large that owner Michael Osborn told commissioners it would dwarf his iconic diner and make it feel “irrelevant.”

    That word stayed with me.

    As Pasadena grows, how do we make sure the neighborhoods, places, buildings and businesses that carry our history do not become irrelevant in the process?

    The challenge is not to preserve everything exactly as it is. Cities change. They have to. But growth should not erase the visual and cultural context that gives a city its identity.

    The proposal at 540 South Lake Avenue is for 71 residential units on six assembled parcels stretching between California Boulevard and Granite Drive. Some people have started calling the site the “octopus” because of the unusual way the separate parcels have been assembled into one development site.

    Commissioner Srinivas Rao described the proposed building as “one long monolith.”

    He went even further:

    “It is the kind of buildings that destroy cities.”

    State housing laws, density bonuses and changes to our own specific plans mean Pasadena will continue to grow. The question increasingly isn’t whether Pasadena will change. It is how well we manage that change.

    The site sits at an important transition between the South Lake commercial district and surrounding residential neighborhoods. Historic Mentor Court is immediately adjacent, and Madison Heights is currently under consideration for landmark status. This is an area where Pasadena’s commercial, residential and historic character come together — and where the scale of new development matters enormously.

    These places are not impediments to Pasadena’s future. They are part of what makes Pasadena worth investing in.

    What does this particular corner of Pasadena represent, and how should a project of this scale respond to everything that is already there?

    This is not a blank canvas. It is an already-developed corner of Pasadena, with existing businesses, historic resources, established neighborhoods and a complicated collection of parcels being assembled to fit a much larger project. Some buildings will be demolished, but the surrounding context remains. The challenge is not simply fitting 71 units onto the site. It is fitting them into a place that already has an identity.

    The question should not simply be whether the building meets the rules or whether its mass can be rearranged. It should also be whether the project, taken as a whole, respects the place it is entering.

    The public response reinforces that point. Dozens of people showed up for a preliminary consultation — before there was even a vote to approve or deny anything. That should tell both the City and the developer that people see something here that deserves serious attention.

    When residents show up that early in the process, the message should not simply be dismissed as resistance to change. It should be treated as information about the place, the project and the level of concern it is already generating.

    Density is a number. City-building is something else entirely.

    If we are going to add substantially more density, we have to start by looking at what is already there and asking what is worth protecting. New development should respond to the character of a place, not simply overwhelm it.

    Can larger buildings be broken into smaller visual forms? Can height be concentrated where it has less impact on historic neighborhoods? Can new architecture frame our mountains and historic buildings rather than compete with them? Can mature trees become organizing elements of new projects rather than obstacles to be removed? Can we continue to make room for the small, quirky, longtime businesses that give our commercial districts personality?

    All of this should be part of the equation. Good design is not simply about the building itself. It is also about how that building relates to its surroundings and the impact it will have on the community around it.

    This is not about freezing Pasadena in time. It is about making sure new development adds to the city without diminishing what already makes it special.

    There are other issues surrounding the South Lake project that deserve attention as it moves forward — parking, traffic, the meaning and permanence of its 55-plus designation, and the proposed removal of protected trees. Those questions matter, and they should be answered.

    But the larger question raised Tuesday night was more fundamental:

    How do we accommodate growth without allowing new development to overwhelm the places and character that already define Pasadena?

    Our history should not become irrelevant simply because our city is growing. The best new development should make room for Pasadena’s future while respecting the places that gave the city its identity.

    Pasadena is going to change. Our responsibility is to make sure that change makes the city better, not simply bigger.

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  • Connecting the Dots Again

    Last week, while walking through Beverly Hills, I came across a stunning oversized art installation positioned on a sidewalk corner—an enormous vase overflowing with vibrant flowers.

    It was bold, joyful, and impossible to miss.

    It did not sit behind gates or inside a museum. It stood directly in the path of everyday life, transforming an ordinary corner into something memorable.

    I found myself smiling.

    And almost immediately, I wondered:

    Why couldn’t Pasadena do something like this?

    I began thinking about places in Pasadena that could benefit from that same kind of imagination, and Fillmore Station came to mind.

    Imagine a Metro train station that reflected the extraordinary area around it—a station that was beautiful, welcoming, and a joy to pass through. Sadly, that is not what Fillmore Station feels like today.

    The station and its surrounding public spaces are visibly in need of attention. Right beside it sits ArtCenter’s South Campus, one of the world’s leading institutions of art and design. The connection seemed obvious.

    The answer is not to copy Beverly Hills. It is to ask how Pasadena might express its own identity just as boldly.

    And ArtCenter is only one of the remarkable strengths surrounding Fillmore Station.

    Huntington Hospital is essentially at the station. Caltech is a short bike ride away. New housing, established neighborhoods, local businesses, medicine, research, education, art, science, and regional transit all converge in this one part of Pasadena.

    Yet we rarely talk about those strengths together.

    What if we stopped seeing Fillmore simply as a station in need of repair and began imagining what it could become?

    What if it were viewed not merely as a transit stop or a collection of development projects, but as a reflection of Pasadena’s creativity, innovation, healing, and intellectual life?

    The artwork in Beverly Hills stayed with me not because Pasadena should imitate another city, but because it reminded me what beauty can do.

    It can cause people to stop.

    It can create memories.

    It can give a place its own identity.

    And it can make us imagine something better.

    There was a time when Pasadena seemed to spend as much energy imagining its future as it did debating its challenges. Today, our public meetings often feel consumed by immediate conflicts and competing priorities. Those conversations are necessary, but I hope they do not crowd out the larger question of what inspires us—and what kind of city we are trying to create together.

    A city does not function through isolated decisions.

    Housing affects schools and the stability of neighborhoods. Schools influence where families choose to live. Beautiful public spaces support local businesses, and thriving businesses generate the sales tax that funds city services.

    Public safety shapes whether people feel comfortable using parks, libraries, transit, and neighborhood commercial districts. Transportation influences housing and economic development. Historic preservation contributes to identity and tourism. Art and culture attract visitors, employers, students, and investment.

    Even homelessness cannot be understood apart from mental health, addiction, housing costs, prevention, public safety, economic opportunity, and the capacity of surrounding neighborhoods and service systems.

    It is all connected.

    Yet too often, these subjects are discussed one agenda item at a time—one housing target, one bike lane, one budget request, one shelter proposal, one development project.

    Each discussion may be necessary. But a city is not a collection of separate categories.

    It is a living place, and every decision affects the whole.

    Perhaps that is why the flowers affected me so deeply. They were not simply beautiful. They were a reminder that one thoughtful idea can change how people experience an entire place.

    Somehow, Pasadena needs to return to that kind of thinking. The best ideas do not exist in isolation. They create ripple effects that strengthen neighborhoods, support local businesses, enrich public spaces, and inspire people to see their city differently.

    Pasadena did not become extraordinary by accident.

    Someone imagined the Tournament of Roses.

    Someone imagined Caltech becoming one of the world’s great centers of scientific discovery.

    Someone imagined The Huntington as a place where art, literature, history, and gardens could inspire generations they would never meet.

    Someone imagined ArtCenter.

    Someone imagined the Pasadena Playhouse.

    Someone planted the trees that still define so many of Pasadena’s streets today.

    Someone designed the homes and buildings that, more than a century later, still give Pasadena so much of its character.

    They were not simply managing a city.

    They were creating one.

    I do not pretend to know exactly how Pasadena returns to that spirit of imagination. I do not have a blueprint or a master plan.

    But I do know that great cities are not built by treating every issue as an isolated problem.

    They are built when people understand the relationship between education and neighborhoods, art and business, public spaces and economic vitality, transit and opportunity, history and innovation.

    The dots are already here—our institutions, our neighborhoods, our businesses, our parks, our artists, our scientists, our doctors and nurses, our educators, our volunteers, and our history.

    What is missing is not potential.

    It is the vision that connects it all.

    Perhaps it is time for Pasadena to start connecting the dots again.

    Check the home page for ways to show up for Pasadena!

  • The Picture on the Box

    When you begin a puzzle, you don’t start with the pieces. You start with the picture on the box.

    That picture doesn’t tell you where every piece belongs, but it gives each piece meaning. Without it, you’re left trying to solve one small section at a time, hoping everything eventually fits together.

    For more than a decade, I’ve attended City Council meetings, Planning Commission hearings, neighborhood meetings, and community planning workshops. Like many residents, I usually arrived focused on a single issue—a development proposal, a traffic concern, homelessness, public safety, housing, or another important topic.

    But over time, something changed.

    I found myself paying less attention to the individual pieces and more attention to the picture that was beginning to emerge.

    What kind of Pasadena were all of these decisions creating together?

    That question has stayed with me because cities aren’t experienced one agenda item at a time. They’re experienced through neighborhoods that evolve over years and decades. Every decision—whether about housing, transportation, economic development, homelessness services, public facilities, parks, healthcare, historic preservation, or environmental sustainability—becomes part of a much larger story.

    Some readers may say, “Isn’t that exactly what the General Plan and our Specific Plans are supposed to do?”

    They’re right.

    In fact, I participated in the planning process for my own neighborhood years ago. Those conversations felt different. We weren’t reacting to a proposal already before us. We were asking a much broader question: What do we want this neighborhood to become? Residents, businesses, planners, and city leaders worked together to create a shared vision before the individual projects arrived.

    Looking back, I realize those planning efforts began with the picture on the box.

    Today, I sometimes wonder if we’ve become so busy responding to immediate challenges and evaluating individual proposals that we’ve drifted away from that way of thinking. The picture hasn’t disappeared. Our General Plan, Specific Plans, and community vision still exist. But too often, our conversations begin with the next piece instead of returning to the picture that should guide where it belongs.

    The City already evaluates whether proposals are consistent with zoning, the General Plan, and applicable Specific Plans. Those findings are an important part of good planning. But too often, the discussion feels technical rather than meaningful. We demonstrate compliance, but we don’t always communicate the vision.

    Residents shouldn’t have to piece that story together on their own.

    Every significant proposal should answer one simple question:

    How does this decision help build the future we said we wanted for this neighborhood?

    Not simply how does it comply with the plan.

    How does it advance the plan?

    How does it strengthen the neighborhood?

    How does it fit with the surrounding housing, businesses, institutions, transportation, parks, public spaces, and other planned investments that together create the character of a place?

    Those are the conversations that make planning meaningful. They connect technical analysis to the lived experience of the people who call a neighborhood home.

    That isn’t a criticism of any one project or any one decision. Pasadena has faced extraordinary challenges in recent years—housing mandates, homelessness, infrastructure needs, recovery from the Eaton Fire, public safety concerns, budget pressures, and the everyday demands of governing a complex city. Those issues deserve serious attention.

    But perhaps they also remind us why planning matters.

    Planning isn’t simply about deciding whether a project is appropriate. It is the discipline of making sure today’s decisions strengthen tomorrow’s Pasadena.

    Pasadena has no shortage of worthy goals. We care about housing, homelessness, economic development, public safety, parks, infrastructure, historic preservation, environmental sustainability, and thriving neighborhoods. Every one of those priorities matters.

    The challenge isn’t choosing between them.

    The challenge is ensuring they strengthen one another.

    The picture on the box shouldn’t belong to one councilmember, one planner, one neighborhood, or one interest group. It should be a shared vision shaped by the people who live here, work here, invest here, and who will inherit this city long after today’s agenda is forgotten.

    Residents are often invited into the conversation after a proposal has largely taken shape. By then, we’re usually discussing a single piece of the puzzle. Imagine instead beginning with the picture itself—engaging residents, businesses, institutions, property owners, and city leaders earlier, and asking not only whether a proposal is appropriate, but how it contributes to the future we have already said we want to create.

    I believe Pasadena is capable of this conversation. We are a city with extraordinary neighborhoods, remarkable institutions, engaged residents, talented planners, dedicated public servants, and people who care deeply about our future.

    We don’t need to invent a new philosophy.

    We simply need to return to one that has served us well.

    Before we decide where the next piece belongs, let’s spend a little more time looking at the picture on the box.

    The picture on the box isn’t just a vision. It’s a promise—a promise that each decision will be measured not only by whether it can stand on its own, but by whether it helps create the Pasadena we have chosen to build together.

    Because if we can agree on the picture, placing the pieces becomes a great deal easier.

    That, to me, is what planning is for.

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