Larson to focus on ‘visible, usable’ if elected to Hermosa Beach council

Trent Larson stepped up to the microphone at a City Council meeting this summer, and did something he wasn’t wild about: he congratulated the council on finishing the installation of solar panels on the roof of the Community Center.

Larson had his concerns about the project. He worried the city was replacing a roof that still had years of usable life just so that they could erect the solar panels. (City staff at the time said that the roof had been battered in last winter’s heavy rains, and said that maintenance workers had made more than 20 temporary fixes to the center’s roof in recent years.)

But when the city announced that it had completed the project under budget, and had beat a state deadline that allowed them to receive reimbursement for excess power generated, Larson was among the first to offer praise.

Larson is one of seven candidates seeking three open seats on the City Council in the November 7 election. His frequent emphasis on projects that are “visible and usable,” contains an implicit criticism that the existing council is too focused on the ethereal and the fanciful, particularly in the case of the council’s recent environmental efforts. But Larson also does not ignore the fact that environmental issues do matter to a significant portion of the community. He is staking his campaign on the the idea that, if elected, he will be able to work even with those who did not vote for him.

“I’m an easy person to talk to. And I’m not so hard-headed that I can’t change my mind. I have to do it all the time. It’s part of my job,” said Larson, who works as a vertical market manager at Office Depot.

Prioritizing tangible projects as Larson hopes to do means an emphasis on city infrastructure. Larson singled out the lack of progress on sewers as particularly disappointing, and said he would work to speed the pace of public works if elected.

“He’s pragmatic, he’s realistic. He really wants to focus in on the basic needs of the city: public safety and infrastructure. They’ve been a low priority for a while,” said former mayor George Barks.

Larson offered a number of reasons for what he characterized as the slow pace of municipal projects. The biggest, he said, was a failure of the council to adequately motivate city staff.

“The city relies on consultant studies as cover. I like to see action. [City staff] are under a different kind of urgency than the private sector,” Larson said.  

Larson lamented delays in the planning process for two projects that he sees as offering major benefits for the city: the Skechers showroom and executive office complex on Pacific Coast Highway, and the Strand and Pier Hotel and retail complex. Staff is at work on draft environmental impact reports for both.

Community development director Ken Robertson has said that staff and consultants are analyzing potential impacts, and that each project is challenging to review. In the case of the Skechers proposal, for example, Robertson has noted that Hermosa must coordinate with planners in Manhattan Beach, where a portion of the project lies, as well as CalTrans, because of its location on the highway.

For Larson, the delays are not acceptable, and create a risk that Hermosa will come to be seen as a bad place to do business. When asked about the risk that hastened review could miss or underestimate significant environmental impacts, such as traffic, Larson was not overly sympathetic. He said that such inconveniences are a part of life, and that people who knowingly buy or rent near a commercial area should expect them. But he also argued that staff would have more time to analyze these impacts if they were not tasked with other priorities.

“You only have so much time. What are you going to focus on?” Larson asked.

If elected, Larson may have a hard time shifting the focus other council members. At least two of the current council members are not up for reelection, and the two running enjoy the advantage of incumbency. But for some of his supporters, the prospect of avoiding 5-0 decisions is reason enough to vote for him. Resident Kent Allen said Larson could fill departing Councilmember Carolyn Petty’s frequent position on the losing end of 4-1 votes.

“He’s speaking for the person who doesn’t know that there is a council meeting every other Tuesday. He doesn’t have any ideology, he just has common sense. He is the logical replacement for Carolyn Petty,” Allen said.

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