Threatened by Smog-Control Plan, Southland Furniture Industry Says

The Los Angeles area’s furniture industry, which employs an estimated 63,000 people and generates annual sales of $1.3 billion, asserted Tuesday that it could be driven out of business by a stringent pollution-control rule proposed by the South Coast Air Quality Management District.

“If adopted in its present state, it (the rule) will force closure of hundreds of plants in Southern California and result in massive unemployment in our communities,” Gary Stafford, chairman of the air pollution committee of the California Furniture Manufacturers Assn., said in a statement.

And AQMD officials hinted that the district might be willing to see the furniture makers leave, either by moving or going out of business, if that’s what it takes to clear the smog in the Los Angeles basin.

The district, an El Monte-based agency whose board is composed of representatives from state government and the counties of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino, also noted that it is under orders from the federal Environmental Protection Agency to bring the basin into compliance with national clean-air standards.

“Our air quality is the worst in the nation,” AQMD spokesman Tom Eichorn said. “In order to provide air quality that the EPA deems safe, there may be some industries that have to leave the basin.”

A hearing and the AQMD board vote on the proposal are scheduled for July 8.

Larry Berg, director of the Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California and a representative appointed by the state Assembly to the AQMD’s board, said he is “concerned” about the future of the furniture companies “because it is a major industry in the basin.” But, he added, “We just don’t have that many options.”

“There may be some businesses--I’m not sure this is one of them--that will be unable to meet the standards” required for cleaner air, Berg said. “It’s going to hurt.”

The target of the AQMD’s crackdown is the finishing process used by manufacturers of wood furniture and cabinetry, whereby they apply paint, varnish and other coatings to their products.

Often the coatings are applied with high-powered sprayers in enclosed “spray booths,” and the excess spray is sent outside through vents. There are hydrocarbons in the coatings, and, when the hydrocarbons are mixed with sunlight, they cause ozone--the major component of smog.

The AQMD wants to eliminate 80% of the industry’s hydrocarbon emissions, either by requiring that manufacturers equip their operations with new emission-control devices, or by using coatings that contain fewer of the hydrocarbons. Heavy users of furniture coatings would have two years to accomplish that reduction; smaller outfits would have four years.

Barry Wallerstein, an AQMD program manager, said heavy users of coatings--such as makers of expensive furniture requiring several finishing stages--would need the add-on devices. The smaller firms might be able to use the less-damaging coatings, he said.

But Sharon Rubalcava, outside counsel for the California Furniture Manufacturers, asserted that the alternative coatings “don’t exist,” and every wood furniture maker will need to buy the new devices.

However, the devices cost $250,000 or more per spraying booth, and cost up to $1 million a year to maintain, she said. That’s a cost most Los Angeles-area furniture companies cannot afford, she said.

The cost of acquiring and maintaining the equipment exceeds the net worth of most local furniture companies, Rubalcava said. “And the annual operating costs are greater than their current profits, so they won’t have the ability to borrow the money to get the equipment and even if they did, it would eliminate their profits.

“Our position is that they will all be out of business,” she said.

Rubalcava said her group has proposed an alternative plan, in which many of the solvents in coatings would be replaced with less harmful components. She claimed that effort would cut down hydrocarbon emissions by 40% over the next six years, at a much lower cost.

Some manufacturers said if the government does not modify the regulations, they plan to move out of Southern California, and in some cases out of the country.

Ralf Jacobsson, president and chief operating officer of B. P. John Furniture Co. in Santa Ana, said installing the latest in emission control technology could cost that firm up to $10 million by the July, 1989, deadline that has been proposed for meeting the AQMD standard.

Consequently, he is considering moving the company, one of the largest wood furniture manufacturers in California with 550 employees, to another state.

“We are going to try our best to comply with the law. But at this point it doesn’t seem possible from a technological standpoint,” Jacobsson said. “There is no doubt about the problem with the environment. It has got to be cleaned up. But give us a reasonable time to accomplish it.”

“To our knowledge there is no technology that will work,” concurred Richard Wood, owner of Gaylan Industries, an Anaheim-based furniture maker. Wood has said that adoption of the AQMD’s proposed regulations could force him to move his manufacturing from Orange County to Mexico, causing him to lay off all but 30 of his 300 workers.

“I am hoping some form of reasonableness will come to bear on the thing,” he said. “I don’t think a lot of thought was given to the economic repercussions.”

There are about 1,200 furniture makers in the Los Angeles area. Although most of the firms are relatively small, with less than $35 million in annual sales, the local industry is the second largest behind the big furniture makers located near the North Carolina-Virginia border.

The local industry accounts for about 22 tons, or 2%, of the 1,246 tons of hydrocarbons emitted into the area’s atmosphere daily, the AQMD estimates. By contrast, oil refining contributes 16 tons and cars, trucks and other vehicles account for 656 tons.

Despite the furniture industry’s relatively small contribution, coatings and paints overall account for 25% of the daily hydrocarbons emitted into the air, and those products have become a major target of the AQMD’s crackdown.