EMR can restart its fire-prone Camden scrapyard after it ensures sprinkler system works, judge says

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EMR, the multinational scrap metal recycling company whose facilities in Camden have been the site of repeated fires, can soon restart its metal shredder in the city’s Waterfront South neighborhood.

A New Jersey Superior Court judge temporarily stopped the city from enforcing a cease operations order against EMR on Wednesday. The city suspended the company’s junkyard license at the shredder site in early June, days after a two-alarm fire there sent hazardous levels of air pollution into the neighborhood.

Judge Steven Polansky wrote in an order Thursday that EMR must ensure its fire suppression system is fully operational before restarting the shredder and, “as a condition of continued operation,” must implement all recommendations from a consultant the company hired to review its fire safety procedures following the latest fire.

Christina Allen, a social worker and mother of a young child who lives just blocks from the shredder, said she “felt traumatized all over again” when she heard the news. Allen has evacuated her home three times due to fires at EMR facilities.

“I was just picturing the fire trucks riding down the street towards the facility, just another fire happening,” she said. “It kind of put me back in survival mode.”

EMR’s five facilities in Camden’s predominantly Black and Hispanic Waterfront South neighborhood break down, shred and export scrap metal for remelting into steel. The company’s operations in the city have been the site of more than a dozen fires since 2020, according to the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Some of these blazes have spewed hazardous air pollution over the neighborhood, leading some residents like Allen to evacuate their homes and leaving them with lingering psychological impacts.

During the two-alarm fire at the shredder facility on May 29, EMR’s new automatic fire suppression system partially malfunctioned, according to Camden Fire Chief Jesse Flax.

The city will have to argue at an August hearing why the judge should not permanently stop Camden officials from enforcing their cease operations order.

Judge’s order comes after Camden City Council rejected a settlement with EMR

After Camden suspended EMR’s junkyard license in early June, the company sued the city, arguing the suspension was “groundless.” The city considered settling with the company, but at a meeting Tuesday, City Council unanimously rejected the agreement. 

The proposed settlement would have required EMR to submit operating plans to the city and make operational changes, including maintaining a 24/7 permanent fire watch at the facility, training employees four times a year on fire safety protocols and creating 20-foot fire breaks between material piles.

While the judge’s order reverses the city’s action against EMR, city leaders framed it as a win. Mayor Victor Carstarphen, City Council President Angel Fuentes and City Council Vice President Arthur Barclay, who represents the Waterfront South neighborhood, called the judge’s order a victory in a joint statement Wednesday.

“EMR will now be required by the courts to run a safe site and that has always been our top priority,” the officials wrote. “Furthermore, the [memorandum of understanding] between EMR and the City remains in effect and the City will continue to regulate fire safety though the Camden Fire Department and the Bureau of License & Inspections will aggressively regulate junkyard operations.”

The contractor report Polansky referenced in his order recommended EMR complete installation of the fire suppression system, test it and employ a temporary 24/7 fire watch to patrol the facility until that is complete.

The contractor also recommended EMR train employees to use the system in automatic and manual modes, separate material by type before it enters the facility, and develop procedures for scanning incoming material with portable thermal imaging devices.

For fighting fires, recommendations include that employees only remove burning material from piles if water is being applied. After a four-alarm fire in 2025, firefighters said EMR employees made the fire worse by moving burning material from a scrap metal pile onto a conveyor belt leading to the shredder.

EMR continues to threaten layoffs, but does not specify number

EMR employs over 500 people at its U.S. corporate headquarters and five industrial sites in Camden, including nearly 200 who live in the city.

In its lawsuit filed June 15, the company argued that the city’s cease operations order had already cost it $10 million in lost revenue and operational costs, and would require layoffs. In a filing Wednesday, EMR USA CEO Joe Balzano said the revenue losses had ballooned to around $40 million.

After City Council rejected the settlement agreement, EMR “concluded that it could no longer delay workforce decisions,” Balzano wrote, and issued layoff notices to the Teamsters union, which represents 274 employees across EMR’s Camden sites.

One notice included in his filing, dated July 8 and covering employees of EMR’s My Auto Store site, said layoffs will be effective July 15 and that the “exact personnel to be laid off” would be specified later. A second notice in the filing did not specify the facility affected, number of employees to be laid off or effective date.

“The cease-and-desist order is unwarranted,” Balzano wrote in the layoff notices. “We are pursuing all available remedies. We believe that the Court will allow us to reopen. We further believe that we will reach a long-term resolution with the City of Camden.”

Residents and advocates demand safety changes at EMR

Residents and environmental justice advocates are continuing to push for EMR to leave Camden and, in the absence of that, make safety changes and compensate residents.

A petition being circulated online and a written statement from the Camden Environmental Justice Task Force, a group of residents supported by the nonprofit Center for Environmental Transformation in Waterfront South, demands EMR fully enclose its shredder, monitor air emissions continuously, install the best available technology to screen for flammable lithium-ion batteries, create an alert system for fires at EMR facilities, provide health screenings and emergency safety kits for Waterfront South residents, and pay into a resident-controlled fund every time its facilities catch fire, which could compensate individuals for cleaning their homes after fires.

“EMR not being in this neighborhood is the main goal,” said Kristin Schrum, a mom of two young children who lives blocks from EMR’s shredder and is a member of the task force. “If that can’t happen, or if that can’t happen right now, these are the minimum things that residents need to feel safe.”

The MOU between EMR and the city includes a fund that the company agreed to pay into to fund community needs, but that fund is barred from paying individuals.

EMR will need to lower scrap pile height under new state law

New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill signed a bill into law Wednesday that will require EMR to limit the height of its scrap piles to 20 feet, less than half the limit outlined in the agreement between the city and EMR last year.

The bill also requires scrap metal facilities over a certain size to install remotely operated fire suppression systems and heat detection systems.

In a statement, one of the bill’s sponsors, Assemblyman Bill Moen, D-Camden, said the bill is for residents of Waterfront South and “communities up and down the state where facilities have normalized toxic smoke and air quality alerts.”

“With the stroke of a pen, we are protecting our neighborhoods and advancing public health,” he wrote.