Ban on Sale of Ammo Before Holidays Urged : Weapons: Proposal by L.A. officials seeks to crack down on the use of guns as party noisemakers.

Mayor Tom Bradley and two City Council members proposed Friday that the city ban the sale of ammunition for a week before New Year’s Eve and the Fourth of July.

The proposal is an attempt to cut down on the deliberate firing of guns into the air, a practice that has come to characterize those holidays and has caused injuries and at least one death in recent years.

During the week before the holidays, gun shop owners expand their hours to encourage ammunition sales, Bradley said.

If the measure is approved by the City Council, Los Angeles would be the first city in the country to ban pre-holiday ammunition sales, Bradley said.

“Some people are so terrified they won’t leave their homes on New Year’s Eve,” Bradley said.

To punctuate the point, Bradley played a tape recording that crackled with the sound of gunfire and wailing sirens.

“That was not Vietnam nor was it Panama,” Bradley said. “That was right here in South Central Los Angeles . . . a year ago. People firing their guns without any thought about what will happen when those bullets come down.”

This last New Year’s Eve, Los Angeles police recovered 134 guns and arrested 75 people for allegedly firing guns into the air, police said. More arrests were made this year than last, police said, but reports of shots fired in the city were down 43%. There were eight gunshot injuries in Los Angeles County.

Bradley was joined at a press conference on Friday by Councilmen Joel Wachs and Richard Alatorre, who said they will introduce legislation to ban the pre-holiday ammunition sale and move it quickly through the City Council.

Also, a $500 reward will be offered for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of anyone who fires a gun during the holiday periods, Alatorre said.

“The amount of killing and violence is senseless,” Wachs said. The proposed measure is not gun control, he said. “It’s like stopping the sale of liquor at 2 o’clock in the morning. There’s a point in time when you just have to say, ‘No.’ ”

Spokesmen for the National Rifle Assn. in Washington and Sacramento were not available for comment on the proposal Friday.

Bradley said Friday he believes the ban can withstand a legal challenge and said he will ask officials of other cities in the area to enact similar legislation.

One of the gun dealerships at issue is Western Surplus Stores, which had been asked a year ago to curtail its pre-holiday ammunition sales, but refused, according to Deputy Police Chief William Rathburn.

The manager “told us he had a large inventory that he had ordered specifically because of the high level of sales around New Year’s,” Rathburn said.

Al Campbell, manager of Western Surplus, denied Friday that the stores have ever been asked to curtail ammunition sales around holidays.

“We’ve been getting bad press as if we’re a money-grubbing, unconcerned business,” Campbell said. “How many guns have saved lives? Nobody looks at guns as a positive aspect.”

The stores stayed open on New Year’s Eve “to satisfy customer demand,” Campbell said, adding that many people came in to buy camping gear and warm clothing.

Campbell said he would support the pre-holiday ammunition ban if it applied equally to all stores. “If that’s the public demand, then I’m all for it,” Campbell said.