The Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously Wednesday, Sept. 16, to block Lineage Logistics from rebuilding its burned cold-storage warehouse in Boyle Heights.

The vote bars reconstruction permits for the 491,000-square-foot facility at 1400 S. Los Palos St. until a full investigation into the June 17 fire is complete. The council also set fines of $25,000 to $1 million for environmental violations by businesses that cause neighborhood harm on the scale of the Lineage disaster, The Eastsider LA reported.

Both measures had cleared the Planning and Land Use Management Committee in August.

Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, who represents the 14th District where the warehouse sits, pushed the permit hold. "A facility should not be able to seek a like-for-like rebuild while the fire investigation remains active and the surrounding community is still living with the consequences," Jurado said at the Sept. 16 meeting.

The council took four additional steps. It directed city planners and attorneys to draft an interim control ordinance (ICO) that would ban permits for large cold-storage operations near homes, schools, parks, day care centers and libraries in Boyle Heights. Once finalized and approved, the ICO would last 45 days, with options to extend it by 10 months and 15 days and then by an additional year. The ordinance has not yet taken effect.

Council members also called on city staff to study the feasibility of a $10 million Mitigation Response Fund for odor, pest and vermin relief. That fund has not been created. Separately, the council approved reallocating up to $940,000 in Los Angeles County grant money to the Boyle Heights WorkSource Center, targeting aid for up to 100 workers and 50 businesses hurt by the emergency.

Jurado introduced a motion for a review of solar panel safety systems, including rapid shutoff and de-energizing rules.

The fire erupted June 17 on the warehouse roof and burned for seven days before the LAFD fully contained it. More than 89 million pounds of food rotted inside. Lineage completed the cleanup earlier in the summer at an estimated cost of roughly $100 million, according to The Eastsider.

A health report released Aug. 18 by St. John's Community Health found that 469 of 1,306 patients seen at mobile clinics between June 17 and July 31 had fire-related health problems. About 26.6% were diagnosed with toxic smoke exposure and 24.5% with hazardous substance exposure, The Eastsider reported.

Lineage filed a lawsuit Sept. 10 in Los Angeles Superior Court against Altus Power Inc. and contractor Pearce Services, alleging they started the fire through negligence and faulty solar panel connections. The company alleges about 200 defective connections were identified by May, including roughly 10 near where the fire began, and that the solar system was re-energized after Lineage asked that it stay off, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Los Palos Street Operating, an Altus Power subsidiary named in the suit, called Lineage's claims an attempt to deflect blame. The subsidiary said in a statement that Lineage, as the tenant-operator, bears legal responsibility for site remediation, CBS News reported. The official cause of the fire remains under investigation.

No response from Lineage to the Sept. 16 council vote appeared in public records as of publication. City planners and attorneys have not announced a timeline for finalizing the interim control ordinance.