FAIRFIELD-SUISUN, CALIFORNIA
Portions of the Exide Technologies, a former lead-acid battery recycling plant, are wrapped in scaffolding and white plastic in Vernon, Oct. 6, 2020. (Al Seib/Los Angeles Times/TNS file photo (2020))
Los Angeles’ federal deals give leniency to polluters
In 2015, federal prosecutors in Los Angeles made a deal with the CEO of one of Southern California’s most dangerous industrial facilities, a battery recycling plant that had contaminated thousands of nearby homes with lead dust.
Exide Technologies agreed to demolish its plant in Vernon and pay $50 million to cover the costs of decontaminating the site and cleaning up the mainly working-class Latino enclaves it had polluted. In return, prosecutors spared the company and its executives from criminal charges.
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WASHINGTON
In 2015, federal prosecutors in Los Angeles made a deal with the CEO of one of Southern California’s most dangerous industrial facilities, a battery recycling plant that had contaminated thousands of nearby homes with lead dust.
Exide Technologies agreed to demolish its plant in Vernon and pay $50 million to cover the costs of decontaminating the site and cleaning up the mainly working-class Latino enclaves it had polluted. In return, prosecutors spared the company and its executives from criminal charges.
Neighbors cheered the plant’s closure. But five years later, Exide declared bankruptcy and a federal judge allowed it to abandon the contaminated facility. The building still stands today. The cleanup is unfinished and being financed by California taxpayers. Prosecutors and state environmental regulators disagree over whether the company violated its deal, but the dispute is academic there’s no company left to prosecute.