Simi Valley landfill gets rotting food from LA warehouse fire, raising foul odor complaints from neighbors

Salvador Hernandez, Los Angeles Times on Aug 31, 2026

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LOS ANGELES — Millions of pounds of rancid rotting food cleared from a burned cold-storage warehouse in Boyle Heights are now raising complaints from Simi Valley residents who say they’re grappling with the stench of the decomposing waste that was dumped into a nearby landfill.

At one point, one resident said, the smell of rot was so strong they believed a wild animal had died on a nearby hiking trail.

“We had the smell of rotten eggs or rotten meat,” said George Khalatian, president of the Big Sky homeowners association in Simi Valley.

Last week, the Ventura County Air Pollution Control District issued a notice of violation to Waste Management California, which operates the Simi Valley Landfill and Recycling Center, after several residents complained about an overwhelming smell coming from the landfill after it received food waste from the Lineage Logistics warehouse in Boyle Heights.

Inspectors from the agency investigated the site on Aug. 11 and confirmed the foul smell was coming from the Simi Valley Landfill and Recycling Center, according to the notice reviewed by The Times.

The two inspectors “noted the particular odor emanating from the dumping of putrescent food waste,” according to the notice.

Waste Management California did not immediately respond to a request to comment.

The stench is similar to what residents in Boyle Heights have said they’ve endured for more than two months after a fire broke out in the massive cold-storage warehouse in June. Since then, the company has been working to remove approximately 88 million pounds of rotting food, including meat and fish that was stored inside.

The rotting food has drawn swarms of flies and rats with a foul rancid smell that Boyle Heights residents have said kept them indoors, and business owners have said kept customers away.

On Saturday, Lineage announced it had finished clearing the food from the facility, an effort that the company said it expects to cost more than $100 million.

The work is not yet completed. The company is working to meet a seven-day deadline to power-wash and remove remaining debris from the facility.

In Simi Valley, Khalatian said residents received no warning that the Simi Valley Landfill and Recycling Center would be receiving waste from the Lineage warehouse.

“If we had, we would have, of course, objected,” Khalatian said.

The homeowners association received several complaints about the odor. But Khalatian said many of them, including himself, didn’t suspect the stench was coming from the landfill.

His own home, he said, is about two miles from the landfill, but the strong smell was able to travel the distance.

He and several residents have since filed complaints with the Ventura County Air Pollution Control District, he said, and have not detected the odor in the past five days.

The notice of violation issued by the Ventura County Air Pollution Control District requires the landfill to “return to operating in a manner that does not cause a public nuisance.”

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