Keep the Noise Indoors, Council Tells Auto Shops

By Jorge Casuso
Responding to the concerns of residents, the City Council Tuesday night scrapped a key proposal by auto repair shops that would have allowed them to work outdoors during weekdays and part of Saturday.

The 5-2 decision came after neighbors complained that some of the city's 120 auto repair shops were ignoring a ten-year-old ordinance that prohibits outdoor work. They said that the shops are working on vehicles in the streets and using power tools that create a constant disturbance.

"It's noise torture," said former Councilman Kelly Olsen, who played an audio tape of grinding repair sounds and beamed a video showing black oil streaming into a storm drain. "This is not acceptable in a community that cares about its residents."

Many businesses had complained to the council that recent enforcement of a 1989 ordinance prohibiting outdoor work would be a financial burden that could flatten profits and even drive them out of business. They proposed key changes - including outdoor work during designated hours -- that would only apply to shops that were in existence when the law passed.

"The critical issue is that our shops were designed and built before the current standards," said Chuck Perliter, whose family has owned and operated Santa Monica Radiator since 1923. "All we can do is tear down and rebuild. This is not fair."

Under the council's decision, which will return for a vote this summer, repair shops must enclose outdoor hoists and perform all work indoors.

The council did grant the shop owners' other requests to scale down landscape requirements around the perimeter of their businesses and to allow the storage of old parts outdoors, though they must do so in containers.

"Let's get on the ball now, and let's start enforcing this law," said Councilman Richard Bloom in his first council meeting. "We should not leave this open-ended."

But some council members fear good businesses will be hurt.

"There are a lot of good, honest, hardworking people who aren't causing any problems," said Councilman Robert Holbrook, whose motion to allow some work, like oil changes, to be done outdoors failed.

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