PUBLIC HEARING •
Members of the Juab County Planning and Zoning
Board and the public listen to Kevin Kuhni,
president of Kuhni & Sons explain why the
company wants to move to Juab County. Those
attending were given two minutes to speak to the
board, wheather they were pro or con to the
idea.
By Myrna Trauntvein
Times-News Correspondent
Is Kuhni Sons Inc. a stinky plant that should be kept
from Nephi or is it a good tax base that will bring
needed revenue into Juab County?
Public comment from those interested in making them
can still be addressed to Glenn Greenhalgh, county
planning commission executive director at the Juab County
Center.
Those written comments will be accepted through
Thursday, June 20.
A few of the 60-plus who attended a public hearing
held by the Juab County Planning Commission on a
conditional use permit application made by Kunhi's to
build a new animal rendering plant, spoke in favor of
gathering more information and others were against the
relocation altogether.
Kunhi's hopes to re-locate from south Provo to a site
two and one quarter miles south of the Juab County Jail
on 318 acres of farm ground with the possibility of
adding another 130 acres to that amount.
"It is has rail access, and is near a highway and
freeway," said Kevin Kuhni, president of the company.
The location, for locals, is just south of the USU
Experimental Farm.
Comments were taken during the hearing held in Nephi
in the packed commission chambers at 8:15 p.m. Thursday
night.
Five residents requested the Planning Commission
gather some facts, figures, and numbers before making a
recommendation to Juab County Commissioners on whether to
allow a conditional use permit clearing the way for the
ground, currently zoned for agriculture, to be used for
the rendering site.
"You need to do some empirical research," said John
Reinharz.
For example, He asked, will there be odors from the
plant that will reach Nephi, how much water will be
needed, and what processes or devices will be
implemented? Will the plant grow and will there be a
great increase in traffic on local roads?
The planning commission took no action during the
meeting and will continue gathering public input before
deciding whether to grant John Kuhni Sons Inc. a
conditional-use permit to relocate to an area south of
Nephi.
Paul McPherson, planning commission member, and Jim
McWilliams, president of the planning commission, said
they would like to visit other facilities of the type
that Kuhni's is proposing be built in Juab.
"Are there any other facilities that we can look at?"
asked McPherson.
Chad Brough, Nephi City Mayor, said "I love Kuhni's"
but he said, he was concerned about the site selected in
Juab County. Other sites, further from the communities of
Nephi and Levan might be better suited to hold the
facility. Growth, certain to come to the area, may choose
to locate in the very area where Kunhi's is proposing to
build&emdash;"prime land".
For years, he said, Santaquin and Nephi have each
issued 40 building permits a year. "Now Santaquin has 800
building permits and that growth will catch us."
Greg Rowley, a Nephi City Council member, said the
council was concerned about economic growth and realized
that there was not another facility like Kuhni's in Utah.
"Animal rendering does have a stigma," he said.
Rowley said he would be happy to welcome Kuhni's to
the county but he questioned the wisdom of using the site
which was being proposed.
The greatest concern of those who protested the
relocation of the animal rendering facility to Juab
County is the potential for odor problems.
Al Godek, a chemist at the cement plant, presented
each of the five members of the planning commission with
a printed statement.
"If Kuhni's dead animal processing plant is allowed to
relocate from Utah County and be granted a conditional
use permit in an area between two population centers of
Levan and Nephi, air quality as well as ground water will
never be the same," said Godek.
"If you've ever smelled a dead animal, multiply that
by a thousand and that's how it smells," said Juab County
resident Blaine Malquist, a teacher in Orem, who said he
worked in Provo near the Kuhni plant for three years.
Jeanie Worwood, whose husband works at Novell at East
Bay in Provo, said she thinks the odor is still a problem
even though Kuhni owners say odor is being controlled at
the Provo plant. "I'm sorry, but my nose tells me that it
still stinks."
However Leland Gamette, Provo Economic Development
Director, said that the major reason for relocating the
animal rendering plant was not odor, because that had
been solved with a major renovation two years ago. "They
have out-grown the 8-acre site," he said. Even the
addition of 15 acres owned by Provo adjacent to the plant
would not provide sufficient land for the operation.
Provo has hired "smell police" whose job it is to
investigate bad odor in the community. Bad odor, Gamette
said, was not created at the plant any longer. In fact,
he said, there had only been one incident where odor from
the plant was noted (30 August, 2001) in the two years
since Kunhi's put in expensive equipment to control
odor.
"We are not fighting with Kuhni's, it is a good
business and very viable," he said.
In fact, most of the odor complaints are not directed
at Kuhni's. Now that the clean-up has occurred it is
found that most complaints center on the city's own sewer
lagoons.
Hans Kuhni said his grandfather began the Kuhni plant
in 1939. When Kuhni's began operations, East Bay was
Provo's hinterland and was located near Pacific States
Pipe, on a piece of real estate which nobody cared about.
However, the facility had continued to grow in business
and, in addition, needed to locate all of its processes
inside.
"The animal rendering industry has come a long way
since our grandfather started it," said Hans Kuhni.
"We will take great measures to make sure we're a good
neighbor," he said. "We think we will be a great
contribution to Juab County."
Kuhni workers say the plant is being judged unfairly.
"It seems like Kuhni gets blamed for every f--- that gets
made," said Bryant Tidwell who lives in Nephi and works
in the plant. "There are plenty of places that smell
worse than we do."
Dr. Fred D. Bisplinghoff, Ft. Myers, Florida, a
rendering plant consultant, said not only would odor not
be a problem but ground water would be safe as well.
"The waste water treatment has to be approved by the
state," said Bisplinghoff. "The water treatment facility
would need to meet state standards for a plan which would
service 1 to 5 million people and would meet all modern
sewage treatment requirements."
Not only is approval of the conditional use permit a
long way from any kind of approval by the Juab County
Planning Commission, Provo City Council members still
must ratify preliminary plans which are to purchase the
current Kuhni plant and then re-sell the property it
stands on.
Provo City council members will vote on the land
proposal during their meeting this week.
The Kuhni plant recycles 2.5 million tons of animal
by-products a month which are processed at the site into
products such as soap and animal feed.
It is estimated that re-locating the plant will cost
approximately $7 million, an expense the state, Provo,
Kuhni and East Bay businesses are prepared to share.
It is proposed that a $2.3 million contribution to the
relocation will be made by Provo. The rest of the needed
funds will come from East Bay businesses ($400,000),
Kuhni ($1.3 million) and the state ($2 million).
The Provo City contribution includes the purchase of
the 8 acres on which the plant currently sits. The city
plans to rehabilitate the land and sell it for
development along with 15 adjacent acres the city already
owns.
George Morgan said when he was a boy, Mobile Oil
Company wanted to build a petroleum plant in the
community where he lived. Community residents were told
there would be no odor, but there was and, 15 years
later, there still was.
He said he recently worked for three months at the
hospital in Millard where a large pig farm is
located.
"The stench was so bad I thought everyone in town had
a pig," Morgan said.
