How Local Politics Shape Federal Policy: Business, Power, and the Environment in Twentieth-Century Los Angeles

CHAPTER TWO: INFUENCE THROUGH COOPERATION: The Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and Air Pollution Control in Los Angeles, 1943–1954

chapter two influence through cooperation The Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and Air Pollution Control in Los Angeles, 1943–1954 In the summer of 1943, an acrid cloud settled over downtown Los Angeles . On the streets below, cars collided as “lacrimous fumes” blinded drivers.1 City officials received letter after letter complaining that the smoke destroyed the community, “depressed . . . [the] spirits,” interfered with the pursuit of happiness, and threatened the public health.2 Thus began a decades-long battle to control both air pollution and policy in Los Angeles. Within a few months of the “gas attacks,” as newspapers called the 1943 smog events, city and county officials began to treat the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce as the representative of the Los Angeles public and to dismiss other groups that tried to redirect air pollution control policies. The very controversy over smog reinforced the business community’s political influence; in their struggle to clean Los Angeles’s skies, beleaguered public officials needed all the political support and practical assistance that the chamber of commerce could give them. The Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce enjoyed enormous influence over air pollution policy in Los Angeles County. For decades, city and then county officials treated the LAACC as the representative of the public interest. The business organization achieved this status by assisting and supporting public officials as they tackled what became a chronic urban problem. The LAACC anticipated public policy needs and endorsed early proposals for uniform, countywide regulation. The group secured further legitimacy by enforcing voluntary smoke reductions by its members and sponsoring air pollution research and state legislation. Its proactive responses to air pollution were something of an anomaly; in other cities, business and manufacturing organizations had fought soot and smoke reduction on the grounds that reducing Communities active in Los Angeles air pollution debates, 1943–1950 P A C I F I C O C E A N SAN BERNADINO COUNTY VENTURA COUNTY LOS ANGELES COUNTY ORANGE COUNTY S a n G a b r i e l R . Los Angeles R. N 0 4 6 2 8 mi S A N G A B R I A L L E Y SANTA MONICA MOUNTAINS S A N G A B R I E L M O U N TA I N S PUENTE HILLS San Gabriel R. S a n G a b r i e l R . SANTA MONICA MOUNTAINS S A N G A B R I E L M O U N TA I N S PUENTE HILLS San Gabriel R. S a n G a b r i e l R . Long Beach Santa Monica Los Angeles Glendale Altadena Pasadena Monterey Park Vernon Bell Torrance Beverly Hills Beverly Hills E L V 54 influence through cooperation smoke would hinder profits and productivity.3 The LAACC’s cooperation contributed to Los Angeles’s progress against air pollution while firmly establishing the group’s influence on local policy. The Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce was just as important to air pollution controls as the Shoreline Planning Association was to the establishment of Los Angeles’s public beaches. In contrast to the activities of the Shoreline Planning Association, however, the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce’s air pollution activities excited significant criticism . A number of different organizations arose during the first decades of the battle against smog. These critics complained that public officials did too little to reduce the industrial pollution that everyone knew really caused Los Angeles’s problems. They protested the lack of attention to public health research and complained that air pollution regulations focused too narrowly on economics. Their criticisms grew out of several convictions, including general antipathy toward large corporations and the suspicion that official policy harmed Los Angeles residents but protected industrial interests. This was the same suspicion of industry that was manifest in the campaign to remove oil wells from Los Angeles ’s beaches in the 1920s and, as chapter 3 shows, drove opposition to Whittier Narrows Dam in the 1930s and 1940s. Through all of this, these organizations disputed the LAACC’s right to speak for the general public but still failed to establish the crucial relationships that gave the LAACC its influence. They were too small, fleeting, and late to gain political traction. Their opposition, moreover, pushed air pollution officials and the LAACC closer together. Los Angeles was not the first industrial city to address...