Update on June 13, 2022: John Grant, President of UFCW 770 who represents the workers of Farmer John's Vernon plant, has reached out to L.A. TACO to inform us that they were successful in their negotiations. Read the full statement on their website.
(Vin Scully voice) FAAARmer John! (end of Vin Scully voice) is finally calling it quits in Vernon, mopping up all its blood, guts, and pig anuses and closing shop at its South L.A. meatpacking plant.
In a statement released this morning, Smithfield Foods Inc., the Virginia-based parent company of Farmer John and the country's biggest pork producer, details expectations to cease all harvesting and processing operations in Vernon in 2023 "due to the escalating cost of doing business in California," while moving the majority of its West Coast operations out of state. This includes an intention of exiting Arizona, too, and reducing herds of sows in Utah.
The plant, known for its colorful murals of happy, unsuspecting pigs and cows, has long been both bane and burden to Vernon, mostly for producing the offputting smells of an active slaughterhouse in southeast Los Angeles
Smithfield and former owner Clougherty Packing have been fined and sued numerous times by the EPA over the years for various air pollution violations, including violations of the Clean Air Act's Risk Management Program requirements. Recently, L.A. TACO explored the issue of why a putrid, burning corpse-like smell regularly plagues communities in Southeast L.A., with Farmer John frequently fingered as a suspect.