California League of Latin American Citizens

C.A.L.L.A.C. Affiliated with the National League of Latin American Citizens

P.O. Box 433 Torrance CA 90508-0433 Tel: 213.787.5476 callac@janbtucker.com http://nllac.blogspot.com/2011/08/announcingformation-of-national-league.html

October 1, 2012 Mayor Richard Bloom Mayor Pro-Tem Gleam Davis Councillor Robert Holbrook Councillor Kevin McKeown Councillor Pam O'Connor Councillor Terry O'Day Councillor Bobby Shriver Honorable Mayor Bloom and the Santa Monica City Council: The California League of Latin American Citizens (CALLAC) is extremely concerned about the consideration of an ordinance requiring a permit to hold political, cultural, and/or charity events in residential neighborhoods in Santa Monica. It is intuitively obvious that adoption of such an ordinance requires strict scrutiny since it impacts important right protected by the United States and California Constitutions, as well as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). Incidentally, we request that you adopt an ordinance to make the provisions of the ICCPR self-executing in the City of Santa Monica as an added precaution against any impact on these fundamental rights that this ordinance may create. It is important to look at the history of municipal litigation over impacts on the right to associate and the rights of free speech and expression in the Los Angeles area. For instance, when the City of Compton passed an ordinance modeled on Skokie, Illinois' ordinance targeting neo-Nazi parades, Compton promptly used it to impose an onerous bond requirement on the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers union who wanted to demonstrate during a union organizing campaign. What will the price be for such a permit? Will there be any alternative to payment for the indigent? Will somebody who is illiterate or not literate in English be able to easily comply with the permit application requirement? Will the permit be subject to public inspection under the California Public Record Act (Section 6250 G.C. et seq.)? What portion of the permit application, if any, will be subject to protections similar to those afforded by the California Information Practices Act? Rather than require a permit to conduct actions as contemplated by the ordinance,

can a lesser impact requirement be adopted and experimented with, such as a mandatory or optional free notice form to be created to be filed with the City Clerk and re-distributed to any and all city agencies (e.g., police, building & safety, traffic) that might be impacted by the event? We are requesting that you provide us with a copy of the proposed ordinance and any staff research and/or study documents concerning the proposal. Thanking you for your prompt attention, I remain, Respectfully Yours, Jan B. Tucker State Director, California League of Latin American Citizens cc: Jaime Martinez, President, NLLAC; Bernardo Eureste, NLLAC; Angel Luevano, VP NLLAC; Argentina Davila Luevano, VP-Far West, NLLAC; Patricia Nazario, Secretary, CALLAC; Alex Salazar, Treasurer, NLLAC.