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What to Know
- More than 20 local organizations have received funds donated by Lineage to the California Community Foundation (CCF) to distribute to residents affected by the fire.
- Those organizations are connecting residents to direct cash assistance, mental health support, household supplies and more.
- LA Mayor Karen Bass said residents should save their DWP bills from before and after they fire so city leaders can compare and help residents save money.
Boyle Heights residents were met with Los Angeles city and county employees, as well as with volunteers, who went door to door on Monday with information on how to secure resources in the wake of the warehouse fire that left an infestation of flies and the presence of rats in the community.
As of Monday, Lineage, whose cold food warehouse caught fire last month, said crews have removed 356 tons of food waste from its site. The company was given an Aug. 13 deadline to remove the 85 million pounds of food rotting at its facility following the fire.
While cleanup crews work to meet that deadline, residents who live near the facility have been left to deal with the overwhelming smell of the rotting food. Increasing temperatures have only added to the stench of the rotten food, which has attracted pests.
“The fact that there’s been this serious fly infestation, the fact that neighbors are complaining about the rats …,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass told NBC Los Angeles on Monday. “So, as this situation progresses and is being resolved, it also sparks other concerns. So, we’re trying to address each of these concerns as they come out.”
Among the concerns neighbors have raised is accessibility to resources that have been made to help them. The mayor said she and her team heard loud and clear that residents have expressed confusion in learning where to obtain that support, so volunteers teamed up with city and county employees to deliver that information in person by going door to door.
“We’re talking to residents, making sure that they have basic needs like air filters,” said Enrique Velasquez of the nonprofit Proyecto Pastoral. “We are supporting families with rental assistance. We’re supporting families with money to buy food. We help them with cleaning their homes with related issues to the fire and stuff like that.”
Additionally, a pop-up resource center was hosted on the sidewalk just two blocks away from the site of the fire so residents could connect with resources easily. Bass said the pop-up was created based on feedback from neighbors saying they wanted to be able to get help closer to home.
“When a crisis happens, you just act and you fill up the resource center with what you think people need,” she said. “But as it evolves, then we wanted where we had more time. Then we wanted to plan specifically to programs, services that they requested.”
Bass added that she encourages residents affected by the fire to save their bills from the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. She recommends residents save bills from before the fire and after the fire so city leaders can compare them to try to save money.
“We don’t want them to have to pay more for DWP because they’re running the air filters,” she said.
Where residents can connect to resources
Lineage donated $2 million to the California Community Foundation (CCF) to distribute the funds to affected community members. That money has been split between different organizations to better help residents with medical assistance, food assistance, direct cash assistance and health resources.
See below for a list of the organizations that received the funds to distribute to residents:
- Adventist Health White Memorial – Medical assistance, food distribution, household supplies, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- AltaMed – Medical assistance, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- Barrio Action Youth & Family Center – Direct cash assistance through Angeleno Cards
- El Centro de Ayuda – Direct cash assistance through Angeleno Cards
- Clinica Romero – Medical assistance, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- East LA Community Corporation – Air purifiers/PPE
- East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice – Advocacy outreach, direct relief
- Esperanza Community Housing Corporation – Household supplies, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- Housing Equity & Advocacy Resource Team – Food distribution, medical assistance, temporary shelter, mental health support and financial assistance
- Inclusive Action for the City – Financial assistance
- 211LA – Food distribution, temporary shelter, household supplies, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- Inner City Struggle – Advocacy outreach, direct relief
- LAUSD Education Foundation – Air purifiers/PPE, financial assistance, household supplies
- Los Angeles Regional Food Bank — Food distribution and air purifiers/PPE
- Mexican American Opportunity Foundation – Senior meal services
- Meztli Projects — Air purifiers/PPE and mental health support
- New Economics for Women – BusinessSource Center – Direct cash assistance for small business owners
- Proyecto Pastoral — Food distribution, household supplies, financial assistance and air purifiers/PPE
- St. John’s Community Health – Medical assistance, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- The Salvation Army – Southern California — Food distribution, household supplies, financial assistance and air purifiers/PPE
- Via Care Community Health Center — Medical assistance, mental health support and air purifiers/PPE
- YMCA of Metropolitan Los Angeles — Food distribution, household supplies, mental health support, air purifiers/PPE and financial assistance
For other resources the city has available, click here.
More on the fire
The fire broke out on June 17 and was burning for a week before crews were able to knock it down on June 24.
During the peak of the blaze, residents were ordered to shelter in place as a thick plume of smoke billowed over Boyle Heights and stretched into neighboring communities.
Although a cause for the fire has yet to be determined, representatives from Lineage said they believe the blaze began while a subcontractor working for Atlus Power, which owns the solar panels on the warehouse’s roof, was conducting tests on the panels.
