Council Places a Moratorium on Demolitions : Narcotics: Sixty-day action is aimed at Operation Knockdown. Critics say the anti-crack house program got out of hand.

The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday approved a 60-day moratorium on Operation Knockdown, Mayor Tom Bradley’s year-old program intended to drive crack cocaine dealers from abandoned homes by demolishing them.

The council voted unanimously for the moratorium after several members expressed concern that the program had gone too far, resulting in the demolition of some homes in poor areas that could have been saved.

“The trend is alarming,” said Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky, who sponsored the measure. “The majority of the residences have not been crack houses.”

The Times reported last week that Operation Knockdown was intended to destroy about 70 derelict homes used as crack dens and gang hide-outs, but had quietly expanded as city inspectors received mounting complaints from police and neighbors concerning dilapidated or crime-ridden houses.

As a result, more than 200 homes and other buildings were bulldozed at a cost to the owners of $2,500 to $4,500 each. Some houses had been used by homeless squatters who were then put on the streets.

Over the last week, Department of Building and Safety officials have issued revised figures and now say that only 20 buildings were bulldozed in 1989 under Operation Knockdown. Another 190 dilapidated residential buildings were demolished last year under other programs, the officials said.

Bradley’s office has defended Operation Knockdown and members of his staff said Tuesday that they did not interpret the council action as the imposition of a full-fledged moratorium on the program because the measure contains an exception.

Under the measure approved Tuesday, police and building officials can petition the council for permission to demolish buildings that “pose extreme hazards to the public.” The council must act on such requests within 72 hours or at its next meeting.

“We will continue to bring properties forward that cannot be rehabilitated and are the location of gang or drug activity,” said Mark Fabiani, Bradley’s chief of staff. “There is no moratorium.”

Yaroslavsky said the mayor’s office is “mistaken” in its belief that there is no moratorium. “The council’s action speaks loudly and clearly for itself. . . . I do not expect there are going to be any demolitions in the city of Los Angeles in the next 60 days unless there is a horrible case,” he said.

Michael Bodaken, an activist lawyer who is about to take over as Bradley’s chief housing adviser, said Tuesday he supported the council action. “Whatever you call it, it’s a good thing because it involves the City Council” in the demolition process, he said.

On Monday, Bradley issued a memorandum ordering the Department of Building and Safety to revise its demolition procedures to include some additional safeguards.

He requested that the department make a greater effort to determine whether homes are not repairable before they are destroyed, and that the department notify owners of loans that may be available to repair the homes.

Also, the department must determine whether anyone is living in a structure scheduled for demolition and, if so, must contact the city’s homeless coordinator to arrange for assistance.

BACKGROUND

Under Operation Knockdown, the Los Angeles Police Department works in cooperation with the city’s Building and Safety Department to identify abandoned and dilapidated buildings inhabited by drug dealers and users. Since the aggressive new program was announced by Mayor Tom Bradley last January, the pace of city-ordered demolitions has doubled. The demolitions make Los Angeles one of the few metropolitan areas in the country that is tearing down repairable dwellings in the midst of a housing shortage.