Where a Free Ride Is Among Perks : City of Commerce: With a heavy industrial tax base, its residents get many free services that other towns can’t afford.

Most of us probably wouldn’t think that City of Commerce bears a striking resemblance to heaven. Rogelia Gomez would disagree.

“Compared to where I used to live, this is heaven,” Gomez said. “I just like everything about Commerce.”

Until a year ago, Gomez, 53, a part-time cook who came to Los Angeles from Mexico in 1973, lived in a rough neighborhood in East L.A., with all the unpleasant ramifications thereof--crime, graffiti, an overall deteriorating quality of life.

Then her son-in-law, a longtime resident of Commerce, steered her toward that city. Eventually, Gomez bought, for $200,000, two two-bedroom, one-bath homes on a single lot on Astor Avenue in the western section of the city. Now she lives in the rear house and her daughter and another son-in-law live in the front house with her two grandchildren.

The houses are small, like most of the homes in this predominantly Latino neighborhood. (Once mostly Anglo, Commerce is now 93% Hispanic.) And, like just about everyone else in Commerce, Gomez lives in close proximity to busy freeways, railroad tracks and various industrial enterprises.

But the streets in her neighborhood are clean, the surrounding homes and yards are generally well-maintained, and she can leave her house without fearing for her life.

Her neighborhood is, in short, a decent place to live that is affordable to someone like Rogelia Gomez. To her, that puts Commerce in the heavenly category.

“I am really very happy here,” Gomez says, speaking through an interpreter (her daughter). “I don’t want to leave.”

Gomez is not alone in her enthusiasm for her new town; Commerce residents generally seem to rave about their community.

At first glance, this small city, situated six miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles at the intersection of the Long Beach and Santa Ana freeways, doesn’t appear to be home to anything except warehouses and factories.

Only 7.5% of the city’s 6.6 square miles is zoned residential, while 71% is industrial or commercial. (The rest is parkland, public land and streets.) In fact, Commerce’s most famous man-made landmark is not a church or a museum or a stately Victorian home; it’s the old Uniroyal Tire & Rubber plant, a huge Assyrian-style fortress that faces the Santa Ana Freeway.

Clearly, “Commerce” is not a misnomer.

About 70,000 people work in Commerce every day. At quitting time the vast majority of them stream out of the city on their way home to the nearby residential communities of Bell, Downey or Montebello, or elsewhere.

But 12,000 people live in Commerce, mostly in neighborhoods of small wood-frame or stucco homes with chain-link-fenced back yards. There are five residential neighborhoods in the city, each a small pocket of houses separated from the others by commercial or industrial areas.

Home prices in Commerce range from less than $100,000 for a government-subsidized low-income home to $300,000 for a three-bedroom home in the newer development known as “The Village,” which features landscaped yards, fireplaces and wood fences in the back yards. Most of the homes in Commerce, however, are small bungalows in the $165,000 range.

Except for The Village, which is home to some mid-level managers for the surrounding industries, Commerce residents are predominantly blue-collar. In terms of the residents’ economic status it is not a wealthy city. The 1989 median household income in Commerce was $26,000, far below the countywide median of $38,900.

Admittedly, all that could make Commerce sound like a less than ideal place to live. So why would Rogelia Gomez or anyone else rave about living there? The answer is simple. The industrial nature of the city gives Commerce a tremendous tax base, which allows the city to provide a wide range of services other communities just can’t afford.

For example, the city operates its own bus service, which is free to residents. There are also 35 acres of immaculately maintained parks and recreation facilities, including a swimming pool, indoor pistol range, baseball diamonds, youth programs and so on, all of which are free to residents. (Non-residents who work in the city can use the facilities for a $4 a month fee.)

The city also operates its own post office for the convenience of residents and businesses, and provides reduced-rate cable television service ($9.95 a month basic service) through a city-owned cable system. There are four public libraries--but no library district fees--three fire stations, heavy police protection (provided by the Sheriff’s Department on a contract basis), and four city-funded security patrols.

In cooperation with the Montebello Unified School District, of which Commerce is a part, there are English-as-a-second-language classes offered in Bristow Park in the northwestern part of the city, where many new immigrants live.

Commerce also offers city-funded low-interest housing loans for senior citizens and low-income families, as well as low-interest home improvement and equity loans. Trash pick-up is free. And every year on its incorporation anniversary the city gives each of Commerce’s 3,300 households a free gift. This year it was a flashlight.

By any city’s standards, it’s an impressive list of services and perks and freebies; for a tiny city tucked between two freeways on the non-affluent side of town, it’s nothing short of amazing. It makes City of Commerce sound a little like the Sweden of the Southland.

“One reason I like it is that everything’s free,” says Eva Long, 70, who bought her three-bedroom, one-bath house on Hepworth Avenue in 1943 for $3,800 ($500 down, $27 a month). Long is particularly proud of the city’s four libraries.

“Four libraries in a city this size is pretty special,” she said.

Ironically, perhaps, it was libraries--or the lack of them--that created City of Commerce. Back in 1960, community residents decided to form their own city when the county tried to close the local branch library and let the residents make do with a bookmobile.

Although some nearby cities cast greedy eyes on the area’s industrial base--industry puts a lot of money in government tax coffers but demands relatively little in government services--the residents managed to stave off other suitors and create the independent City of Commerce.

According to Long and others, the city’s name was simply picked out of thin air in the rush to file incorporation papers.

Long has seen a lot of changes since she moved to Commerce. Besides the demographic changes, many of the city’s old “smoke-stack industries”--including a Chrysler plant--have folded, and been replaced by less labor-intensive businesses, such as grocery distribution warehouses.

The Uniroyal plant, for example, is now being rebuilt by Trammell Crow Co. as an office and specialty retail complex called “The Citadel.”

Commerce also is home to a huge poker parlor called the California Commerce Club.

The club figured in one of two political corruption scandals that put Commerce’s name in the news in the past. In 1984, three city councilmen and the city’s economic development director pleaded guilty to soliciting and accepting bribes in a scheme to grant a poker parlor license in return for secret shares in the casino. In 1973, two city officials pleaded guilty to soliciting a $30-a-month bribe from a contractor doing work with the city.

Like most Commerce residents, Long has learned to live with industry as a not-too-distant neighbor. And she is still proud of her city.

“I don’t know where else I’d want to live,” Long says.

“There just isn’t anything to dislike about it (the city),” agreed John Alvarez, 29. Alvarez, who works as a bartender at a nearby hotel, was born and raised on Elk Grove Avenue in Commerce. Eight years ago, when he got married, the city gave him a $28,000 low-interest loan to build a two-bedroom home behind the house he grew up in. His parents still live in the house in front.

“We have a great parks and recreation program,” said Alvarez, who, incidentally, serves on a local citizens parks advisory board.

“Commerce is a rich little city; we don’t pay for any of our programs. Little League, arts and crafts programs--it’s all free. If you have kids, Commerce has a lot to offer.”

All this isn’t to say there aren’t some problems in Commerce. According to Rene Herrera, a real estate agent who lives in the city, one severe problem is overcrowding in some homes and apartments.

He points out that among recent immigrants who want to buy homes in Commerce but have little financial resources, it’s common for two or more families to pool their money to buy and live in one house. That has caused friction between old-line Commerce residents and some newcomers.

“They have to have two families, really, to be able to afford it,” Herrera said. “But it is a problem.”

“That’s a phenomenon that’s not unusual throughout the Los Angeles area,” responded Ray Ramirez, the city’s economic development coordinator. “We try to prevent that, but it’s very hard sometimes.”

There also has been some encroaching gang activity in some areas.

And, again, there is always the inescapable--and not always aesthetically pleasing--presence of industry in this city, sometimes almost in one’s back yard.

Nevertheless, for most residents those problems seem minor compared to what Commerce has to offer.

“We do live around a lot of industry,” says Jamie Cadenas, 30, a homemaker and mother of three children. “But you have to accept that.”

Cadenas has lived in a rental home on Gaspar Avenue for the past three years, but she and her husband, a city employee, want to buy a home in Commerce. They’re hoping to be chosen in a drawing for eight new $90,000 to $150,000 homes in the Veterans Park area. As you might expect, the city is underwriting the project.

“I like Commerce a lot,” Cadenas said. “The city really does a lot for you. I think we’re very lucky to live here.”

AT A GLANCE

Population 1990 estimate: 11,876 1980-90 change: 13%

Median age: 26.5 years

Annual income Per capita: $8,034 Median household: $27,289

Household distribution Less than $15,000: 23.1% $15,000 - $30,000: 33.5% $30,000 - $50,000: 27.8% $50,000 - $75,000: 13.2% $75,000 + : 2.3%