filed a lawsuit<\/a> last week, saying the company that operated a solar array on the building\u2019s roof is to blame for the fire. Fixing the mess has been the company\u2019s top priority since the fire started June 17, Lineage Chief Executive Greg Lehmkuhl told the Los Angeles Times in an exclusive interview. <\/p>\n\u201cWe were focused on doing the right things; we\u2019ve become the convenient scapegoats,\u201d he said. \u201cWe feel like we\u2019ve been misrepresented, given the efforts that we\u2019ve done and how much we\u2019ve tried to work with every constituent to do the right thing in a really, really tough situation that we didn\u2019t cause.\u201d <\/p>\n
Michigan-based Lineage is one of the world\u2019s biggest cold storage companies, with nearly 500 buildings in 19 countries. The 500,000-square-foot Los Angeles warehouse, known within the company as Big Bear, held more than 89 million pounds of frozen food. <\/p>\n
The company said it spent more than $150 million fighting the fire and cleaning up the aftermath. Company leaders worked with Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Jaime Moore and paid for firefighter assistance. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe funded and trucked in fire cannons from oil fields in Texas to get them cannons with much more velocity to help put out the fire,\u201d Lehmkuhl said. \u201cWe funded Chinook helicopters to drop more water and foam on the fire. We were doing anything we could, at frankly any expense, to try to minimize the impact of this fire on the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
When the fire was out, Lineage faced an unprecedented challenge: getting rid of mountains of rotting meat, seafood, bread and other food.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t believe there\u2019s ever been a cleanup of this scale and complexity in the history of the cold storage industry,\u201d Lehmkuhl said.<\/p>\n
Getting the rotting food off racks towering six stories high required hundreds of workers in protective suits to dislodge the moldering food. Crews used forklifts to push the waste outside, where it was loaded into sealed trailers for transport to special dump sites in several states. <\/p>\n
About 400 workers per day logged 210,000 hours and still couldn\u2019t meet the Aug. 14 cleanup deadline.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s only so fast, even with unlimited resources, that you can make this happen,\u201d Lehmkuhl said.<\/p>\n
Lineage worked with neighbors affected by the blaze, interacting with almost all of the hundreds of directly impacted households, he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe mobilized our team and literally went door to door for weeks,\u201d Lehmkuhl said. \u201cWe continue to listen and respond to community requests.\u201d<\/p>\n
Assistance included air purifiers, air conditioners, masks, grocery gift cards, cash assistance offers, temporary relocation and assistance paying utility bills, which rose for many as their electricity needs increased, he said.<\/p>\n
In the lawsuit, Lineage said that Altus Power, which operated a network of solar panels on the warehouse roof as a tenant, was responsible for the fire.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Fire was the result of the negligent and reckless conduct of Altus and its contractor,\u201d reads the complaint, which also names Pearce Services LLC, a contractor hired to perform work on the solar panels, as a defendant.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was not a cold storage fire,\u201d Lehmkuhl said in the interview. \u201cIt was a solar fire.\u201d<\/p>\n
Los Palos Street Operating LLC, a subsidiary of Altus Power, said Lineage was attempting to deflect responsibility. Altus Power said it will fight the allegations in court.<\/p>\n
\u201cLineage\u2019s statement is riddled with misinformation in a blatant attempt to deflect blame for their role in this matter,\u201d a spokesperson for Los Palos Street Operating said in a statement. \u201cAs tenant-operator that controlled the facility, Lineage is legally responsible for overseeing the site remediation, including cleanup, debris removal and remediation resources.\u201d<\/p>\n
Critics of Lineage\u2019s cleanup effort may not understand the scale of the problem the company faced, Lehmkuhl said. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis place is a monster,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s one of the largest sites in North America.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lineage is a real estate investment trust, meaning it is publicly traded and answers to shareholders. In its second-quarter earnings report and call with analysts, the company reported that insurance will cover the damages, but profit will take a hit this year.<\/p>\n
The company wouldn\u2019t speculate whether it would try to rebuild in Boyle Heights and said it is reviewing its options to serve its Southern California cold storage customers. <\/p>\n
The company hopes the community understands how hard it has tried to limit the damage from this disaster, Lehmkuhl said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe showed up at every turn starting from Day 1 until right now, and we\u2019re just frankly disappointed\u201d that the company\u2019s efforts have been misrepresented, he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The company that operates the vast cold storage warehouse scorched in a June blaze that plagued neighbors in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[155583,183904,1827,179,1804,4416,3802,183903,413,4915,183905,48,52,51,181331,148342,47,50,49,63,4455],"class_list":["post-466871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-altus-power","tag-boyle-heights-warehouse-company","tag-cleanup","tag-community","tag-company","tag-effort","tag-fire","tag-firefighter-assistance","tag-food","tag-hundred","tag-june-blaze","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-lehmkuhl","tag-lineage-logistics","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-worker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466871\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}