The elegant cruise ship S.S. Azure Seas,...

The elegant cruise ship S.S. Azure Seas, berthed at the Port of Los Angeles, played host to nearly 200 business people who gathered there Friday for the annual harbor-area Business Outlook Conference, sponsored by the San Pedro Peninsula and Wilmington Chambers of Commerce.

The chamber members and guests discussed such topics as “Retail Trends in the South Bay,” “Southern California Tourism Forecast” and “Development and Gridlock.” For lunch, they dined on smoked salmon and filet mignon. A quartet played soft music while they ate, and a magician performed tricks to the delight the crowd.

Less than a mile away--in another, not nearly so elegant, corner of San Pedro--the Chamber of Commerce was a hot topic of discussion.

At Rancho San Pedro, a 21-acre public housing complex for the poor, more than 50 residents appeared before the Los Angeles Housing Authority to protest a plan, promoted by the San Pedro chamber, to tear down some of their homes to make room for business development.

A portion of Rancho San Pedro fronts onto Harbor Boulevard, just several blocks from the expanding World Cruise Center where the S. S. Azure Seas is berthed. It is that portion of the complex--the segment with the highest potential for development--that the chamber wants to raze.

The residents told the Housing Authority they do not want any portion of the complex demolished. They asked instead that the authority adopt their plan to revitalize--rather than “redevelop”--the apartment complex.

Authority chairman Alvin Greene said there are no plans to demolish or sell Rancho San Pedro, but added that he wants to give the chamber an opportunity to present its plan.

The chamber was invited to Friday’s hearing. But, wrote chamber President Burley Ray Johnson in a letter to Greene, the chamber was asked to attend on short notice and was “tied up with a major chamber conference.”