lawn gnomes were not supposed to be there. Nor barbecues And the elderly prostitute

from daily breeze

Living in Lot B
Temporary lodging for Los Angeles International Airport workers turns into a public nuisance.
By Ian Gregor
Daily Breeze

The lawn gnomes were not supposed to be there. Nor were the barbecues. And certainly not the elderly prostitute.

This was, after all, a Los Angeles International Airport parking lot, not a backwoods RV park. But recently, police and airport officials say, it became difficult to differentiate the two.

The story began innocently enough years ago, when LAX directors began allowing a handful of airline employees to keep motor homes in an airport-owned parking lot tucked behind the Proud Bird restaurant east of the airfield. The idea was for pilots, flight attendants and mechanics who are based at LAX but live far away to have a home away from home, a place to change, shower and catch a few winks.

But during the last several months, the handful of RVs blossomed into a veritable trailer park of more than 125 vehicles -- a bleak forest of beige metal on a carpet of gray, crumbling asphalt. LAX officials say the new arrivals were not airline employees but ordinary citizens, many of whom used to camp at Dockweiler State Beach and migrated inland to homestead in Parking Lot B while the beach site is undergoing renovations.

Some set up barbecues and lawn gnomes outside their motor homes, police and airport officials said. A couple of prostitutes -- including one in her late 60s with a fondness for tight skirts and glittery, silver high-heeled shoes -- plied their trade from their vehicles. A few lowlifes dumped trash and human waste onto the pavement.

"Basically there were people who were residing there on a permanent basis," said LAX police officer Loretta Jones. "It was really bad."

Two weeks ago, following complaints from parking lot patrons, airport police swept down on the RV camp, towed about 11 vehicles with registrations that had expired more than six months ago, and shooed away the prostitutes. Then airport workers plastered all of the RV windshields with fliers announcing that the vehicles had to be removed by May 1 because of "safety concerns."

The latter move didn't sit well with airline workers, who complained to the Board of Airport Commissioners this week that they're being unjustly punished for the sins of others -- and for the airport's own failure to properly manage its parking lot. They also say the looming eviction deadline doesn't give them enough time to find alternate locations for their RVs.

"Airline crews are not the problem," said Bill Baxter, American Airlines' chief pilot at LAX, who is keeping a motor home in Lot B this month. "To single out these employees who are not part of the problem ... is unfair."

LAX officials say they sympathize with the airline workers' plight but insist the current situation is untenable and that they are not in the trailer park management business.

"It was never intended to become a community," said LAX police Capt. LaPonda Fitchpatrick.

Housing key for workers

Many major airports provide lots where airline workers can keep RVs, Baxter said. LAX has accommodated them for decades -- since 2000, in Lot B northeast of Aviation Boulevard and 11th Street, for just $30 a month.

The need for such amenities has never been greater because the post-9-11 upheaval in the commercial aviation industry resulted in many airline workers getting transferred to airports far from their homes, Baxter said.

Bart Lipton was transferred to LAX last fall when Alaska Airlines closed its maintenance facility at Oakland International Airport, which was a manageable drive from Lipton's Modesto home. The airplane mechanic said there's no way he and his wife could afford to maintain separate homes up north and in the Los Angeles area. For the past six months, a 32-foot Seacrest motor home in Lot B -- pounded by aircraft noise and perfumed with the heavy, acrid odor of jet fuel -- has served as his Los Angeles home.

"It's not really desirable, it's a sacrifice I have to make," said Lipton, 45, as a private security officer jotted down the license numbers of his RV and others nearby. "But this has been really helpful and beneficial to me and my family."

LAX officials say things began to get out of hand when members of the public began flooding into Lot B after somehow getting wind of the cheap monthly rates. Today, RVs occupy a swath of the lot's southeast corner. They range from battered, stubby trailers to shiny, state-of-the-art behemoths with satellite TV dishes sprouting from the roofs.

Baxter said the airport created the problem in the first place by failing to enforce its policy of selling long-term parking passes only to airport workers.

"It's complete mismanagement," Baxter said. "You're just inviting abuse."

Some airline workers said they work at night and never noticed any problems in the lot. Others say conditions have noticeably improved since the recent airport police sweep.

Management issues persist

But Michael Biagi, chief of the airport department's landside operations division, said LAX should not be in the business of running an RV lot. And some federal officials reportedly worry that a terrorist could park an RV there and launch a missile at one of the hundreds of incoming jets that scream low over the parking lot every day.

Airport commissioners, who set policy for LAX and three other Los Angeles-owned airports, appeared to sympathize with the airline workers after listening to their complaints Monday. They extended the eviction deadline until July 1, and asked department staff members to see whether they could make alternate arrangements exclusively for airline employees.

It's unclear, however, whether the airport can legally give special treatment to airline workers and whether it can allow people to sleep on a regular basis in the parking lot without water and sewer hookups.

Lipton, the Alaska Airlines mechanic, suggested clustering RVs in one area of Lot B so it's clear who is and is not supposed to be there. He said he would have no objection to the airport doubling the monthly parking rate to pay for additional security patrols.

His supervisor, Mark Howarth, whose shiny, 31-foot Jayco motor home was parked one lane over from Lipton's, suggested assigning RVs to specific, numbered parking spots.

"It's so easy to have a controlled access list," Baxter said. "It's so easy to fix."