INDIAN LAND, N.C. -- Noise so loud it's hard to go about their everyday business. Neighbors now have big plans to fight their county and several concrete plants near their homes.
The Brookchase neighborhood appears to be a perfect winter wonderland, until you look in the backyards and you hear the noise from the big plant.
Ernest Garvin has a wife, a baby, a home. But Ernest does not have peace of mind.
“It’s a nightmare,” he says.
Garvin lives next to a cement plant in his Brookchase home in Indian Land. He says he had no idea the plant was going up when he moved into his house.
On Tuesday, Garvin and several of his neighbors met with an attorney to see what they can do to try to quiet the cement plants.
They have filed a letter of complaint with the Lancaster County Council calling the noise levels from the plants “extreme.” Furthermore, they say the area is zoned “light industrial.”
“We couldn’t find a county ordinance anywhere else in the country that said a concrete plant is light industrial,” said Karen Crawford, an attorney representing the homeowners.
Larry McCullough is new to the county council, elected about a year ago. He attended the meeting Tuesday night and says he sympathizes with the homeowners.
Still, he says, the concrete plants are trying to cooperate.
“Some of the concrete plants have taken actions to help put up some walls, whether the walls are complete, I don’t know,” he said.
McCullough says he wants more information and believes the Council will answer the home owners complaints within the next few weeks.
It can’t happen soon enough for Garvin. “When they’re operating, which can be 24 hours a day, it tears you apart,” said Garvin.
The homeowners expect to hear from the council by mid January. They're hoping for cooperation, a break from the noise. If they don't get it, they say they might file a lawsuit.
