‘Not in my backyard’
By April Baumgarten
Farmers may be in trouble next year if Hazen doesn’t approve plans for an anhydrous tank near Riverside Park, officials said.
But residents echoed one phrase last week at City Hall: Not in my backyard.
“I find it very disrespectful that anyone would even consider building a plant of hazardous material in my backyard, in somebody’s backyard,” Mel Gutknecht said. “I have a lot of friends that are farmers and I am not in opposition (of the center). I am in opposition of the location.”
More than 50 residents attended the Hazen Planning and Zoning meeting Oct. 16. Proponents and opponents spoke for two hours on Enerbase Agronomy’s requests to build an agronomy center. The board voted 3-2 to change nine acres of land east of the Hazen Elevator from agricultural to industrial.
“We have a tendency to want to have a perfect world,” board member Clayton Hoffman said. “We look at what the ag community has done for this area. The elevator is gone. We need to support this community of farmers in the best way possible.”
