These are recent columns, articles and letters by Kevin McKeown. Subjects include
community media, affordable housing, zoning densification, neighborhood groups,
City Council efficiency, "Art Techo" Barnum Hall restoration, parking issues, and more.

"Most people thinking green visualize grass and trees, but look
at the circuit board of your home computer: It's green, too."

"Why is a paper to call our own important to me? Local daily newsprint
is the papier-mache from which we may sculpt community."

"Spanning six decades of Santa Monica history and vision, straddling our city's new fiber-optic
broadband network, an Art Techo Barnum Hall will expand Samohi curriculum opportunities..."

"McKeown's concerns include city-wide neighborhood concerns over the cumulative effect
of planning on traffic, parking, the environment and the quality of life. Of special concern
are safe crosswalks and an appropriate affordable housing policy."

"A community is defined by the connections among its members. Those connections
depend on communication, the very human ability to share ideas and aspirations."

"It turns out democracy is messy but exhilarating. The withdrawal of
funding backlashed into a renewed outpouring of volunteer vigor."

"Like many Santa Monica residents, I live more than a half mile from my nearest city
park. This kind of distance is particularly difficult for seniors and children."

"An institution asking for 55 years of a neighborhood's future
should negotiate fairly and sincerely with our residents..."

"There's nothing nice, and much shameful, about evicting an elderly or disabled tenant."

"Watching our City Council squabble, I wonder why the R1
'granny flat' issue divides rather than unites us."

"With a tiny but transformative signal serving just our eight square miles of Santa Monica,
we could turn the radios we already own into valuable civic tools."

"Left on the street in a cruel game of money-driven musical chairs
might be many of Santa Monica's existing residents."

"I suspect the developer will chortle as he... takes his attorney to lunch so
they don't have to watch the displaced residents schlep out their furniture."

"...housing policies forged over the past two decades, codified by repeated public votes,
are threatened by developer lawsuits and political pressures."

"Yes, we want affordable housing -- but please
don't encourage people to demolish our homes."

"Give us the tools, and we volunteers in the neighborhoods will do the work."

"How do we safeguard public process and encourage the public voice
without gridlocking council meetings with passionately unresolved issues?"

"Take classic Art Deco, restored to full glory. Mix in multimedia technology
to encourage and enhance creative performances. Call it 'Art Techo.'"

"Musical chairs was a fun game, despite the chagrin of being left without a seat.
Less fun is finding yourself without a parking space in your own neighborhood."

"The board of directors of the Wilshire/Montana Neighborhood Coalition is concerned about
piecemeal changes to zoning that could have a detrimental effect on residential neighborhoods."

"Change is always a challenge, but the changes happening right now in Santa Monica neighborhood
organizing promise to bring us into a new era of involvement and participatory energy."