Gun Range OKd Despite Opposition From Police : Compton: Chief says it may bring more guns into the community. Mayor calls venture ‘a good idea.’

The Compton City Council this week approved a new commercial shooting range despite protests from law enforcement officials who warned that the venture could increase gun sales and crime.

Police Chief Hourie L. Taylor had urged the council to reject the proposal by City Clerk Charles Davis and two business owners to open the gun range at 1316 N. Long Beach Blvd., next door to a gun shop. The city’s Planning Commission also rejected the proposal.

The proposed shooting range “appears to be more detrimental than beneficial to the community,” Taylor wrote in a letter to the council. “The Police Department is profoundly concerned with the possession and use of handguns by the public at large.”

But council members, who unanimously supported the project, said there is no evidence the range will contribute to an increase in crime. They also contended that the range will be a welcome addition to the business community.

“People have a right to fire weapons in a confined area,” said Mayor Omar Bradley, who owns a gun. “It’s just a good idea all around.”

The proposal has fueled longstanding concerns about the presence of guns in Compton. Compton was the first in the state to ban the possession and sale of assault weapons after a man armed with an AK-47 assault rifle gunned down five elementary school children in Stockton in January, 1989.

Police officials said murders declined in the city after state and local gun restrictions were passed.

In 1989, the year in which the Compton City Council passed the weapons ban, there were 84 homicides, the highest in five years. Police officials say the number of homicides has fallen every year since the ban. In 1993, the last full year for which figures are available, the number of murders in Compton had dropped to 62. Figures were unavailable for the number of deaths related to guns.

Compton Police Capt. Steven M. Roller said officials are worried that a new gun range may reverse that downward trend and bring an increase in other violent crimes involving handguns.

“Any time you have a location that sells weapons and a place where you can shoot them, that brings more weapons into the community,” he said.

Planning Commissioner Betty Howe said the gun range is not a suitable business along Long Beach Boulevard.

“Most gun ranges are located in an industrial area, not a main thoroughfare,” Howe said.

Davis, the city clerk, contends that the city will be safer if gun owners have a place to practice away from residential neighborhoods. “Maybe some innocent people won’t get hit,” he said.

Councilwoman Yvonne Arceneaux, who said she favors gun controls, supported the range. Arceneaux said she is concerned about an increase in crime in Compton but believes a shooting range will have little impact.

Arceneaux said weapons have been sold at the nearby gun store for more than 26 years and will continue to be sold there even if the range is not built.

“If someone is going to buy a gun, I thought gun practice might be a good idea,” Arceneaux said.

The $500,000 shooting range will have 21 booths--19 for handgun use and two for rifle use. Instruction in gun safety will be offered, said one of the partners, Michael Virgilio, who also owns the gun shop next door. The other partner in the shooting range is Elizabeth Harlan. Virgilio said he plans to eventually move the gun shop into the building that will house the shooting range.

It will be the only gun range open to the public in Compton. The Police Department has a six-stall gun range at its station on Willowbrook Avenue. A shooting range at the Evans Security Academy on El Segundo Boulevard is restricted to gun owners taking mandatory firearms classes and to people training to become security guards, owner Louis Evans said.