City Can’t Seek Reimbursement for Port Services in Hot Cargo Incident

Last summer, when a ship carrying a cargo of hot coal entered Los Angeles Harbor, officials from the Los Angeles fire and harbor departments agreed to allow one of the port’s tenants to unload the $2-million cargo and cool it off.

Eventually, the cooled cargo was reloaded on the ship and sent on its way to Taiwan. Fears that the coal was heating up to dangerous temperatures and was about to catch fire were laid to rest. The case of the Fort Providence, a British-owned ship, was closed.

Yet there were still some nagging questions. Should the city have allowed the potentially dangerous cargo to be unloaded at one of its berths? What obligation does the city have to accept ships in distress? Who should pay for the services provided to the Fort Providence by the Fire Department?

On Thursday, the Los Angeles Board of Fire Commissioners, which oversees activities at the Fire Department, closed the book on those questions, too.

The board voted to accept an “informal opinion” from the city attorney’s office advising that Kaiser International Corp., the port tenant that opened its facilities to the Fort Providence, was acting within its rights and that the city has no authority to interfere in such instances. The board had requested the opinion to clear up its questions about the Fort Providence.

“In reality, the Port of Los Angeles is a landlord which has leased most of its berths to tenants,” said the opinion, written by Deputy City Atty. Donna Weisz Jones with the assistance of Harbor Department officials. “These leases permit tenants to use the berths so long as the uses are for a stated purpose and comply with all laws. . . . It appears, based on our landlord status, that the city’s role in determining whether or not a ship in distress may berth in its harbor is minimal.”

Historic Right of Refuge

Jones said she was unable to find any legal cases dealing with a city’s obligation to provide a berth for ships in distress, although she said that, historically, vessels have had the right to seek refuge by dropping anchor within a port’s breakwater.

Donald O. Manning, general manager of the Fire Department, told the board that in practical terms the city has no choice when ships such as the Fort Providence arrive in the harbor.

“Your options really aren’t too good,” he said. “If you don’t (allow them to dock), you have a bonfire down there, and we don’t have the authority to order them from the port.”

The city attorney’s opinion also addressed the issue of restitution. It advised the board that the city has no power to bill the owners of the Fort Providence or Kaiser International for fire protection services.

The Harbor Department, a profit-making agency within the city, pays about $7.6 million a year to the city’s general fund as a reimbursement for so-called “special services” provided by the Fire Department--which include everything from putting out fires on boats to making safety inspections. The cost of supervising the unloading of the Fort Providence falls within that category, fire and harbor department officials said.

Board President Harold Kwalwasser expressed surprise at the city’s--specifically, the Harbor Department’s--inability to assess Kaiser International for the Fire Department’s costs. “I had thought there would be some provisions in the lease as to whether this is appropriate,” he said.

Harbor Department spokeswoman Julia Nagano said emergency services are routinely provided to port tenants at no extra cost. Moreover, Fire Department spokesman Dean Cathey said the reimbursement issue is a purely philosophical one in the case of the Fort Providence because the department allocated “minimal resources” to it.

“It did not turn out to be a serious problem,” said Cathey, a battalion chief. “We had great concerns when we heard about the temperatures of the coal and we would have had a serious problem if it were to ignite. But that did not occur.”