A major fire at one of the largest kosher meat processing plants in the United States is poised to increase the price of kosher meat ahead of the High Holidays, in addition to devastating the plant\u2019s local community.<\/p>\n
Investigators in Postville, Iowa, said on Wednesday that the fire that devastated AgriStar Processing started accidentally in the facility\u2019s laundry room. The fire, which began on Tuesday, destroyed at least 75% of the plant and has put more than 600 people out of work, Fire Chief Jeff Bohr told<\/a> the local TV network KCRG.<\/p>\n The fire has also interrupted a linchpin of kosher meat production, according to OU Kosher, the oversight agency run by the Orthodox Union.<\/p>\n \u201cThe damaged facility means a significant portion of kosher beef and chicken slaughtered and sold in the US will not enter the kosher supply chain,\u201d Rabbi Moshe Elefant, the organization\u2019s CEO, said in a statement<\/a> on Wednesday. \u201cKosher consumers will feel the impact of the tightening supply with reduction of availability.\u201d<\/p>\n Elefant said OU Kosher was working to \u201cfind solutions for ramping up production at other plants\u201d while warning that the crisis could fuel bad actors.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cUnfortunately, when supply is limited, it creates opportunity for unscrupulous individuals who seek to make money by preying on the well-meaning Kosher observant public,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n Jarad Bernstein, the executive director of the Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines, said the fire represented \u201ca terrible situation\u201d in an email to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.<\/p>\n \u201cThe impact on the local community and the business will be large,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The fire is not the first time that a crisis at AgriStar has sent the community into a tailspin. In 2008, a federal immigration raid at the plant, then known as Agriprocessors, netted the arrest of hundreds of workers and led to the arrest and conviction of the company\u2019s longtime CEO Sholom Rubashkin on 86 counts of bank fraud<\/a>, mail fraud and money laundering. It also led most of Postville\u2019s Jewish residents to leave the town,<\/a> which had developed as an unusual stronghold of Orthodox life in eastern Iowa.<\/p>\n Saying that \u201cmany people\u201d believed Rubashkin\u2019s 27-year prison sentence had been excessive, President Donald Trump commuted Rubashkin\u2019s sentence<\/a> in 2017. Rubashkin\u2019s conviction stands.<\/p>\n Canadian Jewish billionaire Hershy Friedman purchased Agriprocessors and reopened it as Agri-Star. He told JTA in 2016<\/a> that he had done so after being urged by Jewish leaders to ensure competition in the kosher meat processing industry.<\/p>\n \u201cIt wasn\u2019t done for financial purposes; it was done to really cater to the Jewish community,\u201d he said about the purchase. \u201cDuring the time Rubashkin was closed, the price of beef roughly doubled. After we acquired it, it came right back down.\u201d<\/p>\n Friedman also said he had shored up the company\u2019s employment practices, which had run afoul of the law, and made improvements to the slaughter process that had made Agriprocessors a target of animal rights activists.<\/p>\n