Officials at Lousiana-Pacific expected the worst and
they got it. On July 16 the company and two former managers of its
Olathe, Colo., waferboard plant were indicted on 56 counts
including conspiracy, fraud and violation of environmental laws.
Federal prosecutors and EPA criminal investigators charge that
plant managers tampered with an emissions monitor in Olathe, Colo.,
and increased production at night when polluted smoke was harder to
see. The corporation has also come under attack from its
shareholders, some of whom filed a class action suit against L-P
because officials said the expected indictment would not hurt
profits. In the last year, the value of L-P on Wall Street dropped
by more than 50 percent. In what may be its greatest financial and
public-relations liability, L-P also faces massive consumer
complaints about its waferboard siding: customers say the siding
deteriorates and develops fungi after a few years under rain. “It’s
very much like a Presto (pressed-sawdust) log that gets wet,” said
Chris Brain, an attorney suing L-P on behalf of homeowners in
Florida, California and Washington. The company’s financial
responsibility for those complaints could reach $300 million,
reports The Oregonian. The company has already paid $l7 million in
environmental fines in the past two years, and in l992 it paid $2.3
million to four families in Olathe who sued the company because of
its air pollution.
* Shea
Andersen
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline L-P’s problems mount.
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