Council OKs $100,000 to Soundproof Firing Range

Bowing to complaints from Granada Hills neighbors of a police firing range, the Los Angeles City Council on Friday voted to spend $100,000 to better soundproof the facility.

The money will be used to install sound-reducing panels at the three partially enclosed firing ranges at the Edward Davis Emergency Vehicle Operations Center Firearms/Tactics Training Facility, which opened in 1998 on 44 acres at the base of the Van Norman Bypass Reservoir.

Council members unanimously approved the soundproofing project even though some were concerned about the latest cost increase for a project that started out at $22 million and is now at $28.9 million.

“I am really dismayed that we are finding there were important things that were overlooked in the creating of a very, very expensive facility that was absolutely declared to be state of the art in everything,” Councilwoman Laura Chick said. “To have forgotten about the issues of neighbors and noise is absolutely something we have to correct.”

Construction is scheduled to start on the retrofit project in the next three months.

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Since the training facility opened Oct. 26, 1998, residents have flooded the LAPD with complaints about the sound of gunfire disturbing neighborhoods one to two miles away.

“I am thrilled they have approved this project, and I really hope it solves the problem,” said John Moranville, president of the 500-member Knollwood Property Owners Assn.

Moranville said the association supports the work of the police and would prefer not to have been forced to complain about the noise problem.

Similar complaints have been voiced for years by neighbors of the Police Academy in Elysian Park.

City Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg, who represents the Elysian Park area, believes the LAPD has slighted her constituents by not taking the same strong action to reduce noise in her district as it did in Granada Hills.

“She is frustrated,” said Sharon Delugach, a spokeswoman for Goldberg. “They are not addressing the concerns of another community with the same problems as Granada Hills.”

Goldberg was not present for Friday’s council vote but would have supported the measure helping Granada Hills, Delugach said.

LAPD officials said the outdoor range in Elysian Park would be much more difficult to soundproof. They have also rebuffed Goldberg’s requests to reduce shooting practice at the old range by an hour a day and shift some of the training to Granada Hills.