Local News in Brief : Plan Targets Scrap Yard

In the latest tactic in a two-year battle to close a San Pedro scrap storage company, Los Angeles Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores has proposed downzoning the company’s Gaffey Street site.

In a motion introduced to the City Council on Wednesday, Flores proposed changing zoning and community plan designations for the property from light industrial uses to the more restrictive limited industrial uses. The proposed changes would also apply to several neighboring properties, including the British Petroleum and Petrolane tank farms, city officials said.

Chief Zoning Administrator Franklin P. Eberhard said the changes would make the scrap yard and tank farms so-called “nonconforming uses,” meaning they could not be expanded without city permission. More important, the new designation would allow the city to declare the scrap yard a public nuisance, which would give city officials the power to restrict--or shut--operations.

Residents near the Hiuka America Corp. scrap yard, which fronts on Gaffey and the Harbor Freeway, have complained to Flores about noise and floodlights at the site. Flores attempted to force the company to relocate in 1986, arguing that the scrap yard was violating existing zoning regulations. She was rebuffed, however, by the city’s Board of Zoning Appeals, which sided with Hiuka America.

The City Council is scheduled to consider Flores’ motion on Aug. 19.