## Facts

- A. I. Gage and his company owned two adjoining lots on Cochran Avenue in Los Angeles, acquired in 1930.
- Gage operated a plumbing supply business on the lots while also maintaining a two-family residential building; parts of the premises were used for residential, office, storage, and materials staging purposes.
- When the use began, the area was commercially zoned and the plumbing business was permitted; later zoning classifications also permitted the use.
- In 1941 the City reclassified the property into an R-4 multiple-residence zone that did not permit the plumbing business, making the existing business a nonconforming use.
- The zoning ordinance required nonconforming uses to be discontinued by the later of five years after becoming nonconforming or June 1, 1946.
- Evidence showed commercially zoned property was available within about half a mile and that estimated relocation cost was less than 1% of Gage’s minimum gross receipts over a five-year period.

## Issues

1. Whether a zoning ordinance may constitutionally require an existing lawful nonconforming use to terminate after a five-year amortization period.
2. Whether applying the amortization requirement to Gage’s property constituted an unconstitutional deprivation of property without due process.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s denial of injunctive relief.
- The court held that requiring the nonconforming plumbing business to cease within five years was a constitutional exercise of the police power as applied.
- The court directed entry of judgment for the City, allowing enforcement of the amortization provision and related injunctive relief.

## Legal Principles

- Zoning ordinances are presumptively valid exercises of the police power enacted to protect public health, safety, and general welfare.
- A municipality may use amortization to eliminate nonconforming uses by allowing continued operation for a specified period, then requiring termination.
- No property owner has a perpetual right to maintain a nonconforming use; long-standing lawful use does not immunize the property from later reasonable zoning regulation.
- The constitutionality of amortization turns on reasonableness, assessed in light of the use, the time allowed to adjust, feasibility of relocation, economic impact, and the public interest in implementing a comprehensive zoning plan.
- An amortization requirement is not confiscatory where the owner has adequate time to adjust and the burden of relocation or termination is not disproportionate to the public benefits of eliminating incompatible uses.

## Conclusion

The court upheld a zoning amortization provision requiring termination of a nonconforming plumbing supply business after a reasonable period, ruling that phasing out nonconforming uses through time-limited continuation can be a valid, nonconfiscatory exercise of municipal police power.


City of Los Angeles v. Gage, 127 Cal. App. 2d 442 (Cal. Ct. App. 1954)