Closure Urged for Plant Near School

A group of community activists again demanded the closure of a metal-plating company across from an elementary school just south of downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday.

“We’re prepared to do what it takes to make sure our neighborhood is safe again,” said Martha Sanchez, a chapter chairwoman of the Los Angeles Assn. of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, at a news conference outside Palace Plating.

The company has operated across the street from 28th Street Elementary School since 1941. But in recent years, it has been the target of a campaign by parents and teachers who have complained of unusually high rates of illness at the school. They have charged that the illnesses were related to the chemicals from Palace Plating.

The Los Angeles city attorney’s office filed charges in February accusing the company of illegal disposal of hazardous waste, including chromium and cadmium, and ordered operators to clean up the plant.

“They’ve been making some progress,” Frank Mateljan, a spokesman for the office, said Tuesday. “We continue to monitor their facility and ensure they are in compliance.”

The state Department of Toxic Substance Control reported in September that “the school is safe for students and faculty.”

Jose Tirado, a manager at Palace Plating, said after the news conference that the department “didn’t find anything. I don’t understand what’s the deal.”

But Scott Kuhn, legal director of Communities for a Better Environment, which has been working with ACORN, said, “We really need to question whatever facilities like this should be allowed to operate so close to schools.”

A survey by the school district’s Department of Environmental Health and Safety this summer found that more than 300 industrial facilities are located within 500 feet of schools, said department director Angelo Bellomo. That list went to state and county regulators, Bellomo said, in the hopes that those agencies would enforce safety standards and possibly increase the frequency of inspections.

As the school district moves forward with its $14-billion, 120-school building project, situating many new schools on former industrial sites, it will face environmental issues.

After the discovery that the site of the proposed Belmont Learning Center had underground gases and seismic issues, bringing a flood of lawsuits, state laws changed, Bellomo said.

The district now must conduct a barrage of tests before it considers a school site.

“It’s a trade-off,” Bellomo said. By choosing industrial properties, the district can avoid taking people’s homes by eminent domain. But then it also must face the realities of environmental risks.

“That’s what we face if we don’t put schools on residential land,” Bellomo said.

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Times staff writer Jessica Garrison contributed to this report.