VAN NUYS : Residents Oppose Swap Meet at College

Nearby residents say Valley College officials were “incredibly arrogant” and “insensitive” for planning a weekend swap meet on the campus without considering its impact on surrounding homes.

About 150 people gathered Wednesday at a local elementary school and vowed to fight the open-air market they believe will harm property values and burden their Van Nuys neighborhoods with more traffic, crime and noise.

“We’ve already got problems with burglars,” said one man. “We don’t want increased traffic in our alleys, with 10,000 people coming into our neighborhood.”

Their crime concerns were echoed by Shelly Gale, an Los Angeles police officer assigned to the Van Nuys Division.

“The Police Department sees swap meets as a place to fence stolen property--not all of them, but many of them,” Gale told residents. “I am concerned crime will go up on the weekends, and maybe during the week, because of the swap meet.”

Valley College officials planned the market as a fund-raiser for their patrons’ association, which provides student scholarships. Advertisements for the event characterized it as a swap meet, but officials say the market will offer antiques, collectibles, fruits and vegetables, rather than discounted items sold at such meets.

“It is meant to be a community fair, very family-oriented,” said Dennis Reed, dean of community relations for the college.

Neighbors are skeptical. Many said they were irritated to learn about the market through newspaper ads, rather than from campus officials.

“They aren’t a good neighbor,” said resident Frank Catalano. “They don’t care about the community. They only care about themselves.”

For Fulton Avenue resident Chuck Gondell, the swap meet is the latest in a series of intrusive campus events. Gondell says he has tolerated an annual jazz festival and traffic from Sierra Club events and hazardous materials roundups held on campus periodically, but he dreads vendors who’ll set up their wares before the market starts.

“They’re going to camp out on my yard,” said Gondell. “That’s too much. I didn’t sign on for that.”

The swap meet was scheduled to open Saturday, but earlier this week Valley College officials postponed it to the fall after hearing about the opposition from residents.

Although no Valley College representatives attended the meeting Wednesday, President Tyree Wieder said in a May 26 letter that campus officials are sensitive to the neighborhood’s concerns.

She said the campus’s 3,400-plus parking spaces are expected to accommodate market patrons and that college officials will respond to concerns raised by residents.

“In planning this project, we did indeed consider the neighborhood and felt that this venture would add to the community, not detract from it,” Wieder wrote.

Residents have gathered about 150 signatures on a petition opposing the swap meet.