Temple City Leaders Say the Time Is Right for Disarmament Policy : Government: A weapons collection kept in Civic Center was part of emergency plans. But new city manager says she ‘certainly wasn’t ready to hand out guns to anyone.’

The good people of Temple City can be forgiven for letting their guard down just a bit.

After all, the world is a far different place than it was in 1970, when city leaders stashed away 13 sets of pistols, holsters, handcuffs and batons to be used by trained volunteers in the event of a civic emergency.

Although the city has always contracted with the Sheriff’s Department to provide police services, officials wanted to make sure that if the Cold War turned hot and Soviet bombs started dropping, their tiny community wouldn’t get lost in the shuffle.

But times have changed and council members in this San Gabriel Valley city decided recently that their cache, long stored in a vault at the Civic Center building, was a liability. Declaring the materiel “abandoned surplus property,” they quietly turned in their guns to deputies at the sheriff’s Temple City substation.

“We had no idea what the country may have been getting into,” former Councilman Lou Merritt, an antique gun collector, said Thursday. “Anything seemed possible. At the time, we thought we were doing the right thing.”

After incorporating in 1960, founders of this town of 32,000--which last year had no murders, two rapes and 37 robberies--decided that one of the first priorities was to develop an emergency response program.

By 1970, they had paid $1,223 for 13 guns and two foam-lined suitcases to hold them. They placed the cases in a locked cabinet, inside a walk-in vault. Only the city manager held the key.

The first recruits were the council members themselves, but over time the program grew to include several dozen volunteers. In the beginning, they met once a month to take target practice, train with the batons and discuss crowd-control strategies.

More recently, about 20 reserves--including housewives, office managers, a nurse and a California Highway Patrol officer--have gathered every June to practice at a nearby shooting range.

But when Denise Ovrom took over as city manager earlier this summer, she decided such matters were better left to law enforcement professionals. “Emergency or not, I certainly wasn’t ready to hand out guns to anyone,” Ovrom said. “There was just no reason for us to have those weapons.”

The Sheriff’s Department, which knows of no other communities that are similarly armed, said the weapons--most of them .38-caliber and .357 magnum Smith & Wessons--probably will be used by deputies for training.

“They’re in good shape,” said Sgt. David Lubeley of the Temple City substation. “Just a little dirty.”