It comes as great news that the city has been fining Garelick Farms $1000 a day since August 4 for allowing a nuisance odor emanating from its sprawling Lynnway plant.
The city has finally shown its teeth in all its might and is now threatening to stall or to remove entirely its beverage production license which would close the plant.
This part of the drama will play out in court September 1, a date set by the city when it will enter a criminal complaint against Garelick.
In the meantime, the odor continues.
Everyone notices it.
Businesspeople along the Lynnway are sick of it – and we would imagine that everyone working at the milk plant itself cannot stand it.
Garelick needs to become the kind of corporation that this city can tolerate.
Right now, Garelick is intolerable and the odor coming from its plant is worse.
It is either unable, unwilling or feels it cannot afford to spend the money necessary to operate its plant the way General Electric does.
There is such a thing as being a good neighbor as Walmart is, as the Lynnway’s numerous automobile dealerships are and then there is Garelick Farms – with a terrible stench coming out of its operations and causing an environmental nuisance everyday.
The leaders of Garelick Farms may need a larger fine everyday in order to move them to where they ought to be.
We suspect the money they’ll have to spend is what’s holding up the end of the odor.
At the same time we are feeling the Garelick Farms people are coming closer to the understanding that Lynn is at the end of its patience and that the court will force the company to comply with state and federal law as well as with the city.
For the life of us, we cannot imagine why it has to come to this when in other communities with much larger production companies the companies comply with high standards on their own.
Passing by the Lynnway last week on Thursday and Friday, we noticed a huge crane and construction work going on the exterior of the Garelick Plant.
We wondered – did they get a permit from the Building Department for the new bits of steel being attached the way a homeowner would be inclined to seek a permit for a new set of front stairs being built?
We doubted it – but we don’t know.
All we know about this company are its products, which many of us tend to buy, and the odor, which they don’t seem to care about.