By Devonte Barr, Columnist
“Can you hit the pause button?”
Elise Swanson, president of the San Pedro Chamber of Commerce and a former trustee of Port of Los Angeles High School, stood before a packed community meeting at the school last week with a pointed question for administrators.
“This is not about the high school. It’s not about educators. It’s not about the students,” Swanson said. “This is about process.”
At issue: the future of a 2.3-acre former Los Angeles County courthouse property in downtown San Pedro—and whether it should become an expanded campus for POLAHS or remain available for commercial development.
The property returned to county control at the end of 2025 after a private developer failed to secure financing for a proposed mixed-use project.
Now, competing visions have emerged for one of downtown’s most visible publicly owned parcels.
POLAHS currently serves around 900 students—the maximum its authorization from LAUSD allows. The school can’t grow enrollment, but administrators say existing programs are bursting at the seams.
Principal Tim Dikdan walked attendees through the school’s constraints: career technical education programs operating under tents on the blacktop; only 12 welding pods when demand exists for 24; no dedicated gym; and theater classes held in a multipurpose room.
“We have students that are banging on doors in order to get into welding and construction,” Dikdan said. “We just can’t house them because we don’t have the space.”
The school’s Career Technical Education programs serve about 275 students—29% of enrollment. Marine transportation, welding, and construction classes currently operate in temporary structures. Basketball and volleyball teams use Peck Park because the school has no gym.
Around 70% of students are socioeconomically disadvantaged. The graduation rate is 94%.
The proposed expansion would include a skilled trades building, a CIF-regulation gym with theater space, a dance studio, and an amphitheater that could host community events like farmers’ markets and concerts on weekends.
School officials emphasized community access: evening and weekend availability for workforce training, partnerships with local organizations, and integration with downtown events like First Thursdays.
Robert Janest, who has lived in San Pedro for 48 years, argued the project would address youth isolation by connecting young people to career opportunities.
“I see this particular workforce development center as being a wonderful pipeline for employment,” Janest said. “This will give them, not a job, but a career beginning.”
Swanson, speaking as Chamber president and a longtime advocate for downtown redevelopment, questioned the process.
“Many of us have worked for over 30 years on the redevelopment of downtown San Pedro, our historic core and our arts and cultural district,” she said.
Swanson noted the courthouse site could support tourism, retail, and arts venues—opportunities that align with decades of downtown redevelopment efforts. She asked whether the county would bring in an economist to study “highest and best use” of the property and consider multiple proposals—rather than what she called “sole sourcing a premium piece of property.”
“This was designed as an urban campus,” Swanson said of POLAHS. “This was not ever thought about, that we were expanding towards the historic core on 6th Street.”
She emphasized she wasn’t opposing school expansion itself, but wanted a broader evaluation of sites and economic impact.
School board members responded that they’ve explored expansion for seven years, reviewing multiple downtown locations, warehouses, and port properties before determining the courthouse site best met their needs for walkability, appropriate zoning, and program requirements.
Jennifer Lamarque, representing Supervisor Janice Hahn’s office, explained at a recent neighborhood council meeting that the California Surplus Land Act—amended in 2021—limits the county’s options.
The law requires the property to either remain in public use by transferring to another public agency or prioritize affordable housing development.
That provision, Lamarque said, “does complicate” proposals for hotel or commercial development that some community stakeholders have discussed.
Supervisor Hahn’s office said it will continue collecting public input before determining the property’s future. For now, the courthouse site remains vacant as residents, educators, business leaders, and public officials debate what should come next.