‘Save EMR’: Scrapyard workers rally in Camden after mayor calls for recycler to close

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Roughly 100 employees of the embattled scrap metal recycler EMR rallied at City Hall in Camden on Tuesday to protest calls from elected officials for the company to shut down.

The workers, whose roles at the company included mechanics, maintenance workers, junk car dismantlers and managers, said they were fighting to keep their jobs. Many are represented by the Teamsters Local 676 union. 

“I definitely need my job,” said Roy Haughton, a Camden resident and utility worker at EMR’s scrap metal shredding facility along the Delaware River. Haughton, who keeps the ground clean at the facility and sprays water to suppress dust, said his two sons also work at EMR.

“This job feeds a lot of people’s families,” he said.

EMR, a multinational scrap metal recycling company with its U.S. headquarters located in Camden, employs 535 people in the city, 191 of whom are Camden residents, according to the company.

EMR has increasingly faced criticism in Camden for the repeated fires at its facilities. A massive fire last year caused roughly 100 nearby residents to evacuate their homes and left some with concerns about their health.

After a two-alarm fire at the company’s scrap metal shredding facility along the Delaware River early Friday morning, city, county and state elected officials called for EMR to fully cease operations in Camden. Friday’s fire was the latest of over a dozen at EMR’s Camden facilities in the past five years, according to a lawsuit filed by the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General earlier this year.

Friday’s fire sparked 911 calls about the smell of smoke as far away as Gloucester Township and resulted in “extremely elevated” levels of fine particulate pollution in some parts of the Waterfront South neighborhood, according to Camden County spokesperson Dan Keashen.

Camden City Councilman Arthur Barclay said Monday evening that the city planned to revoke one of EMR’s business licenses.

“At his request, and with the support of the Mayor, the City Administration is undertaking all necessary legal research to move forward in this regard,” said city spokesperson Vincent Basara in a written statement Tuesday.

EMR employees who marched from near the site of Friday’s fire to Camden City Hall on Tuesday defended the company’s safety efforts. Delmar Brown, who works dismantling junk cars at EMR’s My Auto Store location in Camden, said employees check that equipment is working properly, wear personal protective equipment and screen for flammable lithium-ion batteries.

“Safety is top priority at EMR because of how dangerous the job can potentially be,” Brown said.

He added that the company provides a valuable service for managing debris in the city by providing a place for people to bring metal waste. The Camden facilities purchase, dismantle, shred and export scrap metal for recycling.

“That takes a lot of trash off the streets,” Brown said. “Also, it gives a chance for some people who may not have a job and … they go around collecting cans, they bring the cans to us — that’s some legitimate money in their pocket, versus having to do something illegal or crazy just to get by.”

Alex Sosa, a mechanic who keeps EMR’s shredder running, said shutting EMR down would eliminate jobs for people coming out of incarceration.

“They’re giving people second chances,” Sosa said. “The recidivism rate is going down because of that.”

Kareem Anderson, a senior operational manager at EMR’s My Auto Store site, said he organized Tuesday’s rally.

In a letter to Camden Mayor Victor Carstarphen provided to WHYY News by EMR on Tuesday, EMR USA CEO Joe Balzano urged the city to “return to the cooperative approach” that produced a memorandum of understanding signed between the company and city last year, which included commitments from the company to install an upgraded fire suppression system and donate to a community fund that will make grant payments to nonprofits.

“I’m quite shocked that they took this approach,” Balzano said during Tuesday’s rally, referring to the calls from elected officials to cease operations.

Although Camden Fire Chief Jesse Flax said EMR’s fire suppression system partially malfunctioned Friday, Balzano said it worked as intended by helping to contain the fire. He said that recyclers are like the “catcher’s mitt” of the waste stream, and should not be treated like “villains” for problems caused by lithium-ion batteries that originate upstream.

Balzano said the company has paused receiving scrap metal at its shredder facility and operating the shredder machinery while Exponent, an engineering and scientific consultant firm, examines the cause of Friday’s fire, the company’s operations and its fire suppression system.