ADRIAN — Close to 50 east side Adrian residents came together Monday evening with the Adrian City Commission for what could be called a brainstorming session to determine the best use of grant fund dollars coming to the city from the Crimson Holdings LLC, egg processing facility.

In total, Adrian will receive $100,000 from Crimson Holdings because of a court order ruled last year by Lenawee County District Court Judge Laura J. Schaedler, that said the east side Adrian facility at 1336 E. Maumee St., must establish a grant fund that will be administered by the city as a means to benefit the residents who have been negatively impacted by nuisance odors coming from the operations of the plant.

The grant fund will be provided to the city in two $50,000 installments, one of which the city is now in possession of. The second installment will be given to the city exactly one year from the date when it received the first $50,000 disbursement.

As it was explained during Monday’s special meeting, held in the Merchants Building at the Lenawee County Fair & Event Grounds, the $100,000 is to be used as a benefit for the Adrian residents who physically live in the affected area of Crimson Holdings. To make sure the most impacted residents had their say in what to do with the funds, the city mailed out invitations for the meeting to all addresses within a half-mile radius of Crimson Holdings.

Some residents in attendance suggested the money be used for repairing sidewalks on the east side of Adrian. Another resident, Ken Tokarz, suggested the money could go into a trust fund monitored by the Lenawee Community Foundation where people could continue to build the fund’s amount through donations.

More: Adrian commission to seek public feedback on how to best use grant funds from Crimson Holdings

Some residents, like Jim Bundshuh, who also is a business owner in the city and operates Grace St. Gallery, 1222 E. Maumee St., said there are probably some residents who were more affected by the nuisance odors than others, and those who were most affected should be the ones benefiting from the grant dollars. He also said he didn’t think $100,000 would go very far in making vast improvements. A handful of residents also took aim at the amount of funding, saying it should be more.

As clarified by Elliott, the money is not meant to be treated like damages won in a lawsuit. The grant fund’s establishment was ruled into action by Schaedler and frankly, Elliott added, it was an unprecedented move by the judge.

Among the suggestions of what to do with the funds brought up by the commission included disbursing the funds like microgrants, waiting to use the money until the entire $100,000 is in possession of the city or simply holding onto the money and keeping it in a trust fund. The initial $50,000 the city has right now is in a trust fund, and the money will not be used for any other purpose than addressing Crimson Holdings’ impact, the commission said. The money will not be diverted into any other city fund.

Residents can continue to file odor complaints

City Commissioner Gordon Gauss was among the commission members who encouraged residents to continue filing odor complaints if they notice any obnoxious odors coming from Crimson Holdings, which is no longer operating under court-ordered shortened hours. The facility is up and running 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Those complaints, Gauss said, will still be of help to the Lenawee County courts, the city of Adrian and the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE).

“That’s what’s going to make the ultimate decision of what happens,” he said. “If the problem can’t be fixed, then we are going to have to have some serious discussions about whether (Crimson Holdings) needs to stay in the city.”

Information on how to file an odor complaint or an air quality complaint can be found at Michigan.gov/EGLECrimsonHoldings.

One resident was critical of the city’s response time for acting against Crimson Holdings, saying she started reporting nuisance odors in November 2022 and continued to file issues into 2023. Elliott addressed that comment saying the city has been taking many forms of action against Crimson along with assistance from the courts and EGLE. The legal process takes time, he said, and so does the state’s administrative process.

More: Crimson Holdings: Scrubber installation, public hearing among facility timeline of events

Crimson Holdings, in December 2021, took over operations at the existing Dairy Farmers of America milk processing plant and began processing powdered eggs for the pet food industry. Soon after, local and state agencies began to receive odor complaints about the operations at the company. EGLE has been working with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, and local partners on the ongoing work at Crimson Holdings.

What steps might come next?

While a single solution of what to do with the funds didn’t come out of the meeting, Elliott said the city commission received some good information that it can consider during its deliberations.

“The curdle of solution might be in there as the commission deliberates about it,” he said.

If a decision is made to use the funds in small chunks that could start now, Elliott said. If the decision is to do a bigger project, then that’s probably going to have to wait until all the funds are collected by the city.

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Heather Downs, manager of the Lenawee fairgrounds, said she attended the meeting to hear how the grant dollars might impact area businesses. While it appears the money will be directed toward residents rather than businesses, Downs said she still learned a lot from the meeting.

“Being in this area, we have lost business because of the smell,” she said. “We rent all our buildings out for a lot of weddings, quinceañeras, and we have a lot of things going on during the year. When people come and look at the buildings and they smell the smell, they go ‘What is that awful smell?’ They don’t want to come because of that.”

The impact of the odor really depends on which way the wind blows, Downs said, adding the 2023 fair week was impacted because of Crimson Holdings.

EGLE, through many of its findings and studies, has concluded there is no harm to people with the smell coming from the facility. Scents of ammonia, sulfur and quite literally rotten eggs, are produced from the plant.

“It’s been more nauseating than anything,” Elliott said.

More: Scrubber system to clean gas, odors emitted from Crimson Holdings to be installed Dec. 22

The December installation of a packed-bed scrubber system, designed to clean the air and the emissions coming from Crimson Holdings before vapor is disbursed into the air, is expected to improve the nuisance smells. The scrubber system is currently under a trial phase and will be reviewed for its performance.

— Contact reporter Brad Heineman at bheineman@lenconnect.com or follow him on X, formerly Twitter: twitter.com/LenaweeHeineman.

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: Crimson Holdings: City of Adrian, east side residents discuss use of funds