Vernon motorcycle importer Viva Motorsports Inc. shut its doors within weeks of receiving a $268,000 fine from the California Air Resources Board for allegedly selling motorcycles that did not meet standards.
The air board began investigating the motorcycle and recreational vehicle importer in 2006 after a routine inspection at dealerships turned up all-terrain vehicles and motorcycles that did not meet California air emission standards. Board investigators traced the vehicles back to Viva Motorsports and three operating subsidiaries.
Some of the vehicles had already been sold; the purchasers were notified and some returned their motorcycles or ATVs immediately. Others did not return them and are subject to registration cancellations if they fail emission tests.
The air board sued Viva Motorsports in Los Angeles Superior Court. In June, the court issued a $1.9 million judgment against the importer and its subsidiaries. Air board staff agreed to lower the fine to $268,000, which could increase if further violations are discovered.
“There are plenty of great motorcycles that meet clean air standards,” said Mary Nichols, Air Resources Board chairwoman. “Most dealers know this and carry only bikes that have their California smog certificate. Those who try to cut corners put themselves in a lose-lose situation.”
Shahrokh Mokhtarzadeh, a Century City attorney who represented Viva Motorsports, said his client had no choice to settle, since they could not afford the estimated $500,000 it would have cost to mount an appeal. He also said the $268,000 fine effectively put Viva Motorsports out of business.
“They came up with the money to pay off the fine, but saw that with the economy the way it was and the money they paid out, they could not continue to operate,” Mokhtarzadeh said.
Karen Cesar, a spokeswoman for the air board, said the agency did not intend to put the company out of business.
“Quite the contrary,” she said. “We worked with the judge to negotiate a penalty that both sides could live with. If we wanted to put them out of business, we would have pursued the full stipulated penalty.”
Being Broiled
Regional air quality regulators are preparing to impose new emission control requirements on charbroilers at nearly 1,000 restaurant facilities in Southern California, including several hundred in Los Angeles County.
The South Coast Air Quality Management District has unveiled draft amendments to its restaurant rule that require facilities charbroiling more than 1,250 pounds of beef each week to install scrubbers that cost $30,000 apiece on average.
The amendments will be considered at a workshop scheduled Tuesday at the district’s Diamond Bar headquarters. They could come before the AQMD board for final approval early next year.
The regional regulations follow controversial rules that were adopted in the Bay Area targeting restaurant charbroilers. Many small restaurants were not able to come up with the funds to meet the requirements – especially as the recession hit – and were forced to close.
To soften the impact on restaurants in Southern California, the air district will target only high-volume charbroilers at major chains or steak houses. Of the estimated 13,000 commercial charbroilers in Los Angeles and Orange counties, and the Inland Empire, only about 930 exceed the 1,250-pound threshold, according to a district report. But targeting these 930 charbroilers would remove about two tons of particulates from the air each day by 2013.
The draft rules appear to have the general support of the state’s major restaurant trade group.
“We’ve been working with the district to make sure the rules are not as onerous as those imposed in the Bay Area,” said Andrew Casana, a lobbyist with Englander & Associates who represents the California Restaurant Association.
Casana said the industry won some major concessions from the district, including the exclusion of smaller restaurants and charbroilers used mostly for fish, lamb or poultry. Hotels with multiple kitchens also got a break: Instead of tallying up the charbroiled meat output at the entire hotel to see if it would exceed the threshold, kitchens would be counted individually.
But Casana said it will still be very expensive for the restaurants over the threshold to comply.
“Right now, banks aren’t making loans on pollution control equipment, so it’s going to be very hard to finance this,” Casana said. “But it’s not just the up-front capital cost, it’s the maintenance.”
The cost of service contracts and filters can go as high as $100,000 per year, he said.
“Given the current state of the economy, it’s quite possible that some of the targeted restaurants won’t be able to survive this.”
Staff reporter Howard Fine can be reached at [email protected] or at (323) 549-5225, ext. 227.
