Years after pledging to recover cleanup costs from those responsible for spreading lead pollution over thousands of homes in southeast Los Angeles County, California regulators have finally filed suit against multiple companies connected to the closed Exide Technologies battery recycling plant in Vernon, Latimes.com reports.
The action notably excludes Exide, which under a recently approved bankruptcy plan was allowed to walk away from the half-demolished hazardous site and stick California taxpayers with much of the cleanup bill.
That angered community groups and environmentalists in the largely working-class Latino neighborhoods surrounding the plant, who reacted tepidly this week to news of the lawsuit, asking why it took so long and what it would change on the ground. More than six years into the cleanup effort, thousands of homes and other properties across a massive cleanup zone remain riddled with unsafe levels of brain-damaging lead while families wait for the state to remove contaminated soil.
“Anything that can help recover money and put it toward the cleanup is needed, but it feels like too little too late because the real responsible parties are already off the hook,” said Idalmis Vaquero, a member of the group Communities for a Better Environment who lives in a Boyle Heights apartment complex that has not yet had its soil cleaned.
In the complaint filed Monday, the state Department of Toxic Substances Control alleges that three companies, or their corporate successors, that were past owners or operators of the facility and seven companies, or their successors, that sent hazardous waste or arranged for its treatment or disposal there are liable for cleaning up the pollution under the federal Superfund law. The state seeks to recover more than $136 million it has spent on the cleanup since 2015, plus the future cost of cleaning lead, arsenic and other harmful pollutants left behind at the facility and in surrounding neighborhoods.
The 39-page suit names NL Industries, JX Nippon Mining & Metals and Gould Electronics as previous owners or operators of the plant or their successors. It names Kinsbursky Bros., Trojan Battery Co., Ramcar Batteries, Clarios, Quemetco, International Metals Ekco and Blount as companies or successors of companies that transported hazardous waste to the plant, arranged for it to be shipped there, or both. The lawsuit says those firms were identified on shipping manifests from 1988 to 2015. Exide operated the site from 2000 until its 2015 closure, and was responsible for cleaning up the mess left behind.
Kinsbursky Bros. Vice President Daniel Kinsbursky said that “KBI, like thousands of other companies, shipped recyclable materials to Exide’s Vernon site which California state regulators had for decades authorized Exide (and prior operators) to accept and process for recycling” and was never involved in the plant’s operations.
Patrick Dennis, an attorney for Quemetco, said the company “takes its environmental responsibilities seriously and looks forward to defending itself once the complaint is served and we have had an opportunity to investigate the allegations.”
Kari Pfisterer, a Clarios spokeswoman, said the company was aware of the suit but could not provide further comment on pending litigation.
Calls and messages requesting comment from the other companies were not returned.
Legal experts and environmental groups said that even if the state’s lawsuit succeeds, they expect it will take years for any money to be recouped and put to use cleaning contaminated homes, day care centers, schools and parks.
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