Planning Panel Delays Action on Port Zoning

The Los Angeles Planning Commission, responding to requests from elected officials and two Wilmington homeowner groups, have delayed action on a new zoning plan for the Port of Los Angeles that critics contend will wreck Wilmington’s chances of gaining access to the waterfront.

The controversy stems from the city’s need to make the zoning of thousands of properties around the city, including the port, conform with its General Plan, a land-use policy statement required by state law. The Planning Commission is now considering such a rezoning for the port area.

But at a hearing on Thursday at the Harbor Department headquarters in San Pedro, the commissioners heard a variety of complaints about the proposal, and city Planning Director Kenneth Topping suggested that the city ought to update its General Plan, not just the zoning.

‘Can’t Say It’s Forever’

The General Plan was last revised in 1982. But, Topping said, “so much has changed in the last six years. . . . You can’t take a plan and say it’s forever.”

Should the plan be revised, Topping said, it would be done after the new zoning is adopted and eventually would require a second round of zoning changes.

Topping said he has proposed to port executive director Ezunial Burts that the Harbor Department pay for a city planner to do the revision, which he estimated would cost about $250,000. Burts was not available for comment.

The Department of Airports, which Topping said has community relations problems similar to those of the port, is currently paying for a revision of the General Plan for its area.

In the harbor area, residents and elected officials, particularly Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores, have complained that the proposed rezoning ordinance conflicts with other plans for Wilmington and San Pedro.

In a March 30 letter to Topping, Flores wrote: “The community plans and the port master plan all call for coordinated interfacing of uses, current and planned. Why does this ordinance contradict this city planning policy . . . ?”

The proposed rezoning, which is subject to City Council approval, has been revised since Flores made those comments. However, the councilwoman asked Wednesday for a delay so that additional changes may be made. The commissioners complied by putting the matter on their agenda for June 30, when they will again meet in San Pedro.

Complaints from residents include charges that the plan discriminates against Wilmington and favors San Pedro.

No Buffer Provided

The rezoning would ban new operations involving liquid and dry bulk commodities--such as petrochemicals and coal--on port property adjacent to residential and recreational areas in San Pedro. But it would allow such uses on next to residential property in Wilmington, if the Planning Commission approves.

Former city Planning Director Calvin Hamilton, a consultant for Wilmington homeowner groups, told the commission that “Wilmington’s relation to the port should be treated with the same sensitivity” as San Pedro.

Residents also complained that the plan does not specifically provide for a buffer between recreational and commercial uses in Wilmington.

Two homeowner groups, the Wilmington Home Owners and the Banning Park Neighborhood Assn., supported a recommendation by Hamilton asking for such a buffer zone. Assemblyman Dave Elder (D-Long Beach) also backed Hamilton and the homeowners.

The buffer zone and the ban on additional liquid and dry bulk uses are important to Wilmington residents because they are essential to the implementation of a study that Hamilton conducted, under contract with the city, that calls for creating a recreational waterfront area at the foot of Avalon Boulevard, along the harbor’s Slip No. 5.

Port officials have said that hazardous liquid and dry bulk commodities already being handled in that area could endanger the public and thus preclude any recreational developments there.

Flores and the residents are still pressing the idea, but they fear that a rezoning that allows for new liquid and dry bulk uses in that area could effectively kill the community’s hopes for waterfront access.

In particular, community debate has centered around the Wilmington Liquid Bulk Co., which operates at Slip No. 5. Residents want the company to move to make way for a waterfront park and marketplace proposed by Hamilton.

However, the company has 18 years remaining on its 20-year lease, and Stephen Jones, a lawyer for Wilmington Liquid Bulk, said the company is not interested in moving.

Further, he told the planning commissioners that he thinks the proposed zoning ordinance ought to address the question of whether long-term leases with the port preclude the city from making zoning changes that could require a company to move.

So far, the Harbor Department has backed Wilmington Liquid Bulk. Sid Robinson, director of planning and research for the port, said the department’s position--that Wilmington Liquid Bulk has the right to remain at Slip No. 5 until its lease expires--has not changed.

And in a letter to the planning commissioners, Burts wrote that the department supports the ordinance as it is written.

“We believe the proposed ordinance recognizes the central importance of the Port of Los Angeles to the economic development of not only the immediately surrounding communities but also the state of California and the nation,” Burts wrote.