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You are here: Home / Archives for President’s Message

President’s Message

President’s Message

By Evan Davis
President, WPRA

Healing of west Pasadena’s deep wound begins

On page 3 of the spring 2023 newsletter, WPRA Board member David Bise ably summarizes the City’s first step – appointing citizens to a 710 Stub Working Group – in what will be a long process to decide what to do with the 710 “ditch” that California recently transferred to the City.

All Pasadena residents have had to live with the millions per year in lost tax revenue, making us all victims of the State’s mistake, but WPRA-area residents especially have endured the brunt of health, aesthetic and traffic problems for decades.

The good news is that local visionaries anticipated this possibility nearly 10 years ago when it provided a forum for citizens and community experts to envision what good could come of the State abandoning a 710 tunnel and how Pasadena could shape its own future.The Connecting Pasadena Project (CPP) produced a masterful report that reflects the immense effort and talent of a wide spectrum of participants and could serve as a helpful starting point for the present debate. 

For more on 710/CPP visit The Connecting Pasadena Project (CPP) page on this site.

The bad news is that the State has handed over property that puts Pasadena in a hole, literally and financially. The CPP report estimated in 2015 that “fill the ditch” alternatives would require an initial outlay of up to $80 million, with the hope that property sales and later tax revenues would reimburse our cash-strapped City’s outlay. Although relinquishing the ditch was welcome news, it has come as a surprise to me and others who weren’t involved in the CPP that simply making this neighborhood whole carries such a high cost.

Public input, particularly from the most affected residents matters, and appointing citizens representing every district in the City is a good thing, as any recommendations should have citywide support. Given the wide range of backgrounds and experience reflected on the Working group, I expect a vigorous and wide-ranging debate. I’m hopeful that those involved can find more areas of agreement than disagreement, and that we can build something that’s great for all of Pasadena and in particular for those closest to the ditch, who deserve nothing less given what they’ve had to live through for decades.


Let us know your thoughts on these (and other) topics in an email to president@wpra.net. And if you’re getting this newsletter, but not our email messaging, Neighborhood Alerts, you can subscribe here.

The more things change…

30 Mar 2019

WPRA President’s Message from the Spring 2019 Newsletter

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose is one of my favorite French phrases (out of the five I know). That is to say, ‘the more things change, the more they remain the same.” To see if that maxim holds true, I took a 10-year look back into our newsletter archives (available on our website, by the way). Here’s what I found.

Back then, we were raising the alarm about over-reaching state legislative mandates that dictated the character and development of our community. “Sustainable community” goals were emerging to enable residents to rely less on individual cars and provide greater opportunities for walking, biking and mass transit. Not necessarily bad things. Now, the state is poised to require super-dense development with no parking near transit hubs, requires us to permit additional units on single-family properties (indeed, singlefamily zoning doesn’t really exist anymore) and tells us we should rely on nineteenth century technologies — bicycles and light rail — to solve twenty-first century mobility problems.

Then, we were beginning to see projects that were spatially and architecturally out of sync with Pasadena. The Westgate apartments complex (east of the 710 stub) is an egregious example of that. And let’s not forget that the Ambassador West campus (west of the 710 stub) originally called for development of 2,000 units. Now, multi-story projects pop up in our neighborhoods so often that we just sigh and move on. However, it’s not all bad news: The Ambassador Gardens development, as it is called now and is nearly complete, will end up with about 10% of what the original plan requested, a reduction in which the WPRA played a key role.

Then, we were revising the General Plan. Now, we’re revising Specific Plans … all in the hope that we’ll be able to control our own development destiny. Bonne chance! (Another of my five phrases.) Then, we were worried about our wonderful trees. We are, after all, known as a City of Trees. Now, we’re even more worried about trees … but there are fewer of them.

Then, crime, congestion and traffic safety were prime issues. Also, the city was struggling with serious budget problems, and Caltrans had begun to develop the environmental impact statements and reports that it hoped would justify closing the 710 gap with tunnels. Now, here’s another bit of good news: We are very close to winning the 60-year fight over the 710. This was no easy feat, but, crime and traffic issues continue to dog us and the city is still wrestling with serious budget challenges.

Then, Desiderio was going to be an extension of our beautiful Arroyo. Now, Desiderio will be blighted by an over-built park and unwanted restroom. The restroom alone will sop up $750,000 in scarce park funds that surely would have been better spent elsewhere… for example, for a restroom in the Linda Vista park. Or much-needed improvements to Memorial and Central parks, for which there is no funding.

Then, we were planning trails for Hahamongna. Now, we mourn a huge scar carved in it. All of this to say that the WPRA will continue to fight for our community’s best interests, and you can help! Let us know what you care about and support. Volunteer to assist our committees and advocacy efforts.

And come to our annual meeting on May 8 at the Mayfield Senior School. I hope to see you there.

And finally, back then, WPRA President Audrey O’Kelley began a similar look-back in the Winter 2009 issue with … wait for it … “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Indeed.

Filed Under: President’s Message

A perfect time to consider why we should be grateful

3 Jan 2019

WPRA President’s Message from the Winter 2019 Newsletter.

As I bask in the sun on this glorious Pasadena January day (I’m writing this before then, but it’s pretty much guaranteed, right?), I suggest we take a little time to think about why we should be grateful: Namely, we have a city government that’s pretty well scaled and responsive to what we need. The Goldilocks principle; just right.

Whatever you think of our local elected officials, individually or collectively, they spend far more hours and effort on these “part-time” jobs that take them away from their families and day jobs, than we could ever afford to pay them for.

Whatever you thought or however you voted on the city sales tax measure, it took a lot of courage and expenditure of political and personal capital to propose and advocate for it, or to oppose it.

Fortunately, we don’t have the cutthroat, uncompromising, demeaning, destructive politics we’ve seen all too often on the national level. We also don’t have a culture of corruption like some cities. We won’t have to comb the rubble of Pasadena’s governance and social systems to find enough bricks to rebuild. We’ll take a little credit here at WPRA. We like to think we weigh in thoughtfully on important issues – but there are many more people working hard for the “Pasadena Way.” When I worked for a city council of, well, a really big city in this county, while public testimony was directed to councilmembers, they often were chatting, eating, reading the paper, dozing off or absent. And public “testimony” included shouted vulgarities. We don’t have that here – both councilmembers and speakers tend to be respectful and attentive.

Government has different imperatives than the private sector. Rather than being driven by profit, government provides services and protection. You can’t make a profit on those – they have to be judged on a different scale. Of course, governments sometimes make mistakes and misallocate resources, and we must work to minimize those situations. But if you think the private sector has all the answers … I give you Lehman Brothers, WorldCom, Enron, Sears, WaMu, Toys-RUs, the Pontiac Aztec, “New Coke,” Deepwater Horizon and our very own IndyMac.

So, if you run into your district’s councilmember, or a city staffer, or police officers or firefighters, smile and say “thanks.” It’ll make both of your days. Happy New Year!

P.S. Congratulations to new Pasadena Police Department chief, John Perez. He is a 33- year veteran of the department and has led the department as interim chief since last April, when his predecessor, Phillip Sanchez, retired. We hope Chief Perez will be able to attend a WPRA board meeting this year to share his approach to policing and, more specifically, how he’ll deal with, among other issues, city crime and budget challenges.

Dan Beal president@wpra.net

Filed Under: President’s Message

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West Pasadena Residents’ Association
Post Office Box 50252
Pasadena, California  91115
The WPRA service area is bounded on the north by Colorado Boulevard, on the east by Fair Oaks Avenue and on the south and west by the city limits.
All WPRA activities are funded through membership dues and contributions. The WPRA receives no public funding and has no paid employees. Since the WPRA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit public benefit corporation, contributions and donations are fully deductible to the extent permitted by law.

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