Santa Monica Pier has become quite the venue in the last few years—hosting comedy and music festivals, showing outdoors movies—but events in the city's Twilight Concert Series (which drew 119,000 people during the 10-week 2012 season) have "ballooned into regional draws that encompass far more beach than Pier with crowds in the tens of thousands and pose significant health and safety risks," the city manager told the Santa Monica Lookout, echoing recommendations by the city staff that would make big changes to the way the concerts operate. The suggestions (which the city council will vote on next week) are aimed at keeping events to a manageable size and cutting down the number of people on the beach, where city officials say there's prohibited smoking and boozing going on and where the numbers are so great that it's hard to police. The rules include restricting beach-viewing and booking more local acts (instead of the internationally-known ones they've had in the past)—a move which might cost the city $200,000 in lost sponsorship for the series.
· Santa Monica Wants to Scale Down Pier Concerts [SM Lookout]
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