RIOT AFTERMATH : Burning Questions Remain for Victims of Arson : Rebuilding: Many property owners are hesitant to start anew. They worry: Will there be more unrest? Will the troubled economy improve?

LONG BEACH —  More than two months after riot-related arson turned the commercial building on East Anaheim Street into a charred rubble-strewn shell, uncertainty still lingers over the property like a pall of smoke.

Will the building be rebuilt and once again become the home of a thriving small business, as it was before the riots? Or will it remain a gaping hole in the business corridor, ugly as a broken front tooth, a reminder for years to come of the madness that burned through the streets?

Those are questions that Sidney Anderson, 67, a longtime Long Beach resident and businessman now living in semi-retirement in the tiny Madera County community of Oakhurst, is not yet ready to answer.

First, Anderson wants to see what happens.

“We have two more trials coming up,” Anderson said, referring to the retrial of Los Angeles Police Officer Laurence M. Powell in the Rodney G. King beating case, and the trials of four black men accused in the beating of truck driver Reginald O. Denny in Los Angeles at the start of the riots.

“What’s going to happen if this man Powell is found innocent? Are they going to burn down my building again? What if those other men (in the Denny beating case) are found guilty? Are they going to burn down my building again? These things weigh very heavily on my decision.”

Anderson, who said he is “very disappointed with the way the authorities handled the whole business” of the riots, added that he wants to see what contingency plans, if any, authorities make for future trouble.

“If the National Guard is going to be on every street, then OK,” Anderson said. If not, well, he’s going to have to think about it.

Anderson isn’t alone in his uncertainty.

Owners of damaged or destroyed properties “aren’t rushing to pour concrete and rebuild walls yet,” said Tom Sauter, principal building inspector for the city of Long Beach. Sauter says that of the 30 buildings that were severely damaged or destroyed in the riots, permits to repair damage or rebuild have been issued for only two.

Sauter attributed the slowness to rebuild to both uncertainty about the future and a depressed market for commercial space.

In Anderson’s case, it’s not that he does not want to rebuild. He still cares about Long Beach, even though he does not live there anymore. He would like to see the city prosper. His $234,000 insurance policy on the building probably would pay for most of the rebuilding costs--and for tax and insurance reasons, it could cost him more not to rebuild.

Anderson also feels a certain affinity for the property. He has owned it for almost two decades, and for many years he ran a computer export business from the building.

Until the night of May 2--when neighbors heard glass breaking, saw several young men running from the scene, and then the flames--Anderson had rented the property for $1,800 a month to a hard-working Cambodian-American businessman named Samath Yem. The latter used the building as a family-operated general merchandise store and travel agency, called the Khemara Gift Center and Travel Agency. Both men say it was a pleasant, mutually beneficial business relationship.

But Anderson wonders if rebuilding is worth the effort. Like a man who has seen his property knocked down by an earthquake, he is afraid that if he builds it back up, the earth will just turn around and knock it down again.

“I’ve been feeling very bitter about this whole situation,” Anderson said. After he drove from Oakhurst to Long Beach to survey the damage, he said: “I was very angry at the stupidity of the act. There was nothing to be gained by it. I was very upset, very frustrated.”

Adding to his frustration and anger is the fact that it appears unlikely that the arsonists will ever be brought to justice.

“When somebody commits a crime against you, you would like to see them apprehended and punished,” Anderson said.

Long Beach Fire Department officials said the investigation report on the fire has not yet been completed. But department spokesman Bob Caldon acknowledged that “there’s not much to go on” to identify the arsonists.

Although the future of Anderson’s property is unclear, immediate plans are to turn it into an empty concrete slab. A few weeks after the fire, Anderson received a letter from the Long Beach Department of Building and Planning concerning the property. A curious mixture of sympathy and bureaucratese, the letter began: “The community is deeply saddened by the recent civil disturbance, which, among other things, has caused major building damages.” The letter closed with: “You are hereby directed to remove the building remains and debris, and clean the premises” within 30 days.

Last week, a Glendale-based demolition company began sweeping up the rubble inside the blackened shell of the building. Workers said the ruined walls also will be knocked down.

Meanwhile, the future for the Yem family, eight of whom worked at the Khemara Gift Center and Travel Agency, also remains unclear. Samath Yem, 41, who fled from Cambodia after the communist takeover of that country in 1975, said earlier that he would like to reopen his store in the same location. But he said that would depend on what kind of settlement he could work out with his insurance company--Yem said the store’s entire $200,000 inventory was destroyed in the fire--and on Anderson’s decision about rebuilding.

Yem was out of town and unavailable for comment. But his teen-age son said recently that the family is still uncertain about their plans.

Riot Aftermath One property owner on East Anaheim Street is waiting to see what happens before he rebuilds his riot-ravaged building.