California is giving a Chinese manufacturer it contracted with to produce hundreds of millions of protective masks one more week to get federal certification after the company twice missed the deadline.
The state signed a nearly $1 billion agreement in April with BYD, a Chinese company with Los Angeles-area offices, to deliver 200 million protective masks per month. They were set to start arriving in May. But the company has twice failed to get certification from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health for its N95 masks, the tight-fitting respirators used by health care professionals. To date, none have been supplied to the state.
Following the latest missed deadline — on May 31 — the state could have sought a refund on roughly a quarter-billion dollars it had paid up front. But officials on Friday amended the contract to give the company until June 12, said Brian Ferguson, a spokesman for the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services.
It's the latest twist for a deal Gov. Gavin Newsom announced with fanfare on Rachel Maddow's MSNBC show in early April before his administration had finalized the deal.
In an unusual move, the state paid nearly half a billion dollars — half the deal’s total cost — upfront. BYD refunded half of that amount in May after failing to meet its first certification deadline.
The state still casts the contract as a success because it has received more than 90 million looser-fitting surgical masks from BYD, which have been distributed to local governments, schools and essential workers, Ferguson said. Newsom has repeatedly said taxpayers won't lose money on the contract because the state can get refunded back if the deal collapses.
Read the full story from the Associated Press here.