Boyle Heights Gets 5 New Recovery Measures As Warehouse Cleanup Drags On

LOS ANGELES, CA — The Los Angeles City Council Wednesday unanimously approved five initiatives to assist Boyle Heights recuperate as cleanup of a burned-out cold-storage warehouse remains ongoing.

The motions introduced by Councilwoman Ysabel Jurado, who represents Boyle Heights, will initiate the following actions:

• For the next 60 days, the Bureau of Sanitation will coordinate with Jurado's office to prioritize sanitation requests in Council District 14 for bulky item pick up, street sweeping, power washing and dead animal removal.
• The Bureau of Sanitation will report on the final result of water quality testing conducted on stormwater runoff associated with the week-long fire that occurred in June at the Lineage Logistics warehouse. Sanitation officials are expected to provide an update on the requested cleanup and abatement order issued by the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board.
• The Bureau of Sanitation will suspend CARE+ operations, or homeless encampment resolution efforts, in areas impacted by environmental emergencies as declared by the city or state and to codify the procedure guidelines.
• For the next 60 days, the Los Angeles Housing Department will prioritize the investigation of tenant complaints related to housing code violations, the Tenant Anti-Harassment Ordinance and Rent Stabilization Ordinance for residential properties in Boyle Heights. Additionally, housing officials are expected to report within 10 days on recommendations of increasing violation fines while an emergency declaration is in place.
• The Civil and Human Rights and Equity Department will work to establish an Environmental Justice and Advocacy Advisory Commission. The new commission would be expected to provide guidance to the mayor and City Council on persistent environmental justice issues, foster sustainable education initiatives, promote equity.

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"Recovery also requires us to confront the systems that allowed our community to carry such an extraordinary burden and to build lasting power for the people who live there," Jurado said during Wednesday's meeting.

The councilwoman emphasized the importance of standing up the council's Environmental Justice and Advocacy Advisory Commission, adding that Los Angeles lacks a "dedicated body through which communities can consistently help shape environmental justice policy and hold government accountable."

The council's vote comes one day after the Planning and Land Use Management Committee recommended that no permits to rebuild or reconstruct the warehouse should be issued, and to increase fines up to $1 million for notices of violations or noncompliance. These two recommendations are expected to come before the full council for consideration at a future meeting.

Lineage has missed key deadlines to remove food waste.

Last week, the company said it had removed 104% of the rotting food waste from the warehouse — a figure that was hotly contested by local residents because the cleanup was not complete.

The company later clarified that figure.

"Our prior reporting percentages tied weight removed from the building relative to our estimates of total food weight at the time of the fire. That approach produced figures greater than 100% in our reporting this week, potentially creating the misimpression that food removal waste was complete when it is not," Lineage said Friday. "Accordingly, as we have strived to meet community notification requirements under the AQMD order, we have also reiterated that cleanup is nearly complete but some food waste remains.

"While we are in the final stretch of food cleanup, with hundreds of workers working around the clock, there is still a significant amount of loose food debris that requires manual removal. The final stretch of food waste removal is the most complex, and we continue to prioritize both speed and safety. Going forward, we will evaluate the completion percentage in a manner that will show 100% completion when food waste removal is fully done," the company's statement continued.

"We understand that seeing the number move from 100% is frustrating. It's equally frustrating for us. To be clear, this is a correction to how we measure and report progress — it is not a change in our effort, our resourcing, or our commitment to this community. We are not pausing, slowing, or reducing our work in any way. If anything, this final stretch demands more focused effort, not less urgency, and we are treating it that way."

City News Service