LOS ANGELES, CA – A city deadline for Lineage Logistics to remove rotting food from its fire-damaged Boyle Heights warehouse passed Friday evening with the cleanup still unfinished, deepening a dispute over when the company was required to complete the massive removal effort.
Los Angeles officials maintain that Lineage was expected to remove all remaining food waste by 5 p.m. on Aug. 14.
Lineage disputes that timeline.
The company says its 45-day cleanup period began July 7, when the Los Angeles Fire Department ended its 24-hour fire watch and the company says crews were able to begin full-scale cleanup operations. Under that calculation, Lineage says its deadline is Aug. 20.
The disagreement comes as residents surrounding the warehouse continue dealing with odors, flies, rodents and other effects of millions of pounds of spoiled food left inside the facility after the June fire.
According to Lineage, approximately 93% of the bulk food waste had been removed as of its Aug. 13 update. The company says it is targeting completion of bulk food removal by Aug. 20, followed by additional cleaning, disinfection and detailing through Aug. 27.
That still leaves a significant amount of material inside the damaged warehouse.
The company says much of what remains is loose food lodged high inside a six-story storage-rack system spanning the equivalent of roughly 40 miles of shelving.
Unlike intact pallets that could be removed using heavy equipment, the remaining material is located in areas machinery cannot safely reach, according to Lineage.
Workers wearing full protective equipment are climbing into the racks and manually pushing loose product to lower levels, while other crews remove the material by hand from below.
Lineage has described that final stage as one of the most difficult portions of the cleanup because of the condition of the fire-damaged building and the height and density of the storage system.
The company says more than 100,000 work hours have already gone into the cleanup, with an average of approximately 400 workers at the site each day, more than 500 pieces of equipment deployed and over 4,000 truckloads of debris removed.
Lineage has also said it expects the overall cleanup to cost between $80 million and $100 million.
But those figures have done little to ease frustration among nearby residents who have spent weeks dealing with the consequences of decomposing food.
The warehouse fire began June 17 at the Lineage cold-storage facility at 1400 S. Los Palos Street.
According to the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the roughly 500,000-square-foot warehouse contained approximately 88 million pounds of food products when the fire occurred.
Once refrigeration was lost and the food began decomposing, the aftermath developed into a prolonged environmental and neighborhood nuisance problem rather than ending when the flames were extinguished.
Residents began reporting strong odors described as rotten, sour and garbage-like, while complaints about flies, rodents and other pests spread through the surrounding Boyle Heights community.
South Coast AQMD has continued monitoring conditions during the cleanup and has conducted both stationary and unannounced mobile air-quality assessments around the warehouse and nearby neighborhoods.
The agency says some odor-producing compounds have been found at elevated levels near and downwind of the facility.
During July 30 mobile monitoring, regulators detected elevated concentrations of compounds including methyl mercaptan, which can produce an odor similar to rotten cabbage or rotten eggs, and dimethyl disulfide, which can produce a strong garlic-like smell.
South Coast AQMD said the measured concentrations were below available health-based exposure limits, while noting that people can detect some odors at concentrations far below levels associated with long-term health concerns. Odors can still cause temporary symptoms such as headaches, nausea and irritation of the eyes, nose or throat.
That distinction has become important for residents who continue reporting severe quality-of-life impacts even when regulatory monitoring does not show pollutant levels above established health thresholds.
South Coast AQMD has also taken enforcement action against Lineage.
The agency’s Boyle Heights cleanup and recovery page lists a continuing series of public nuisance violations issued in connection with odors from the facility. The violations are based on Rule 402 and California Health and Safety Code Section 41700, which prohibit emissions that cause injury, nuisance or annoyance to a significant number of people.
South Coast AQMD initially reported 25 consecutive Notices of Violation between July 12 and Aug. 5. Its current public record lists additional violation dates through Aug. 13 as the cleanup and odor complaints continued.
The air district’s enforcement timeline is separate from the city’s disputed Aug. 14 deadline.
On Aug. 6, the South Coast AQMD Hearing Board approved an Order for Abatement imposing more than 90 conditions intended to control odors and accelerate waste removal.
Among those requirements, Lineage must remove and transport at least approximately 8.8 million pounds of food waste per week as quickly and safely as possible.
The order also requires exposed food waste to be treated with odor-control agents and sets conditions for containment, negative air pressure, carbon filtration, community notification and continued perimeter monitoring for pollutants including volatile organic compounds, ammonia, formaldehyde, PM2.5 and toxic air contaminants.
Once all food waste has been removed, the company must proceed with additional cleaning and disinfection requirements.
According to the information provided about the order, Lineage would have seven calendar days after food removal to complete power washing and disinfection.
The air district’s schedule effectively places the expected bulk food removal completion around Aug. 20 based on the removal pace established in the order — the same date Lineage says represents the end of its own 45-day timeline.
That does not resolve the separate dispute with City Hall.
Los Angeles officials say the company was informed that Aug. 14 was the city deadline and that control of the property had transferred back to Lineage earlier than the July 7 date the company is using to start its clock.
Lineage argues that July 7 was the practical beginning of cleanup because that was when continuous fire-watch operations ended and full access became possible.
The disagreement is now moving beyond competing interpretations of a calendar.
Mayor Karen Bass said she has directed city attorneys to pursue civil litigation and explore all available legal options for recovering costs and imposing penalties.
Bass also said she wants the city to pursue a lien against the property if Lineage does not pay amounts ultimately determined to be owed.
The city had already taken formal action shortly after the fire.
On June 29, Bass issued emergency executive orders aimed at accelerating remediation of the Lineage site and strengthening the city’s recovery response in Boyle Heights. The city described the June 17 warehouse fire and its aftermath as requiring an extraordinary cleanup operation.
The city order contains additional milestones beyond removal of food waste.
According to the information provided in the current dispute, Lineage has 90 days from the transfer of the site to remove structural debris and construction waste and 120 days to obtain final environmental clearance from a licensed environmental professional.
For residents living around Los Palos Street, those longer-term requirements offer little immediate relief from the smell and pests they say remain part of daily life.
Martin Ramirez, who has operated a business across from the warehouse for 11 years, said he continued finding maggots around vehicles near his shop Friday.
Asked whether he expected the cleanup to meet the city’s deadline, Ramirez expressed doubt.
“Supposedly it has to finish today but I don’t think so,” he said.
Ramirez said he sought fly traps but was told none were available, forcing him to purchase his own.
“Yeah, I want to know where’s the money, because we asked for the fly stripes and they told us they don’t have it, so where’s the money?” he said.
Lineage has separately reported distributing thousands of items to affected residents and says it has provided more than $3.3 million in direct community support, including air purifiers, portable air-conditioning units, masks, bottled water, grocery assistance and pest-control supplies.
The company also reported expanding fly-control efforts, including additional traps in surrounding areas.
Residents’ experiences, however, have not been uniform.
Consuelo Granados, who has lived near the warehouse for approximately 50 years, said the smell has caused headaches and other symptoms.
“My voice gone. Like it right now, I don’t have any voice. And it’s no good. And nobody help. Nobody help,” Granados said.
She said she runs her air conditioning throughout the day and has observed her cat chasing animals she believes may be rodents coming from the warehouse area.
Granados also described unusually heavy fly activity around her home.
A fly trap placed near her door filled rapidly, she said.
“It’s incredible, believe me. It’s so many, they fall,” Granados said. “I cleaned it up yesterday and I have to take it out today.”
South Coast AQMD says residents can continue reporting odors and other air-quality concerns directly through its complaint system or by calling 1-800-CUT-SMOG (1-800-288-7664).
The agency has also approved up to $5 million in additional funding for residential air purifiers for eligible households in Boyle Heights and surrounding communities affected by the continuing cleanup.
The dispute over the deadline now leaves multiple timelines running simultaneously.
From the city’s perspective, the deadline for removal of the rotting food has passed.
From Lineage’s perspective, the company still has until Aug. 20.
From South Coast AQMD’s regulatory perspective, the company remains bound by the independent abatement order and weekly waste-removal requirements regardless of the disagreement between Lineage and City Hall.
Lineage says it intends to remove the remaining bulk food by Thursday and then continue spot cleaning, disinfecting and detailing through Aug. 27.
“The timeline is dictated by the reality on the ground, not by our willingness or our resources,” the company said in its latest update, adding that it would continue working until the cleanup is complete.
For Boyle Heights residents, however, the measure of completion will likely be more immediate: whether the odors diminish, the flies disappear and the neighborhood begins returning to normal.
Until the remaining food is removed and the warehouse undergoes the required cleaning and disinfection, the recovery effort remains unfinished.
