Recently in 99 Ranch odor Category

In other 99 Ranch news ... the grocer has submitted a plan check to the city's Planning Department to open a Filipino restaurant inside the market. There are a number of spaces inside 99 Ranch for several small shops and two restaurants.

Planning Director James Troyer said there is no timeline as to when the restaurant will receive its permits.

 

The South Coast Air Quality Management District and 99 Ranch reached an agreement today. The market will install odor control equipment that is expected to eliminate the offensive smells.

But don't think you'll be able to buy that barbecued pork just yet.

The market first has to get approval by AQMD to construct the equipment. Then it has to get permission by the city. Then it has to buy and install the equipment. Then AQMD has to inspect the equipment and give the market a final ok before it can deep-fry, stir-fry and roast again.

Market officials hope this can be done by Thanksgiving. Roast duck and other Chinese dishes are popular during that time of the year.

As for the fish fry, a free service once offered in the seafood department, market officials were unsure when or if that service will resume. 

It appears that 99 Ranch and the South Coast Air Quality Management District have agreed on a plan to quell cooking odors that have irritated nearby residents. In the next hour, the market and AQMD staff members will testify to the Hearing Board about the odor control equipment that the market will install.

"The district is comfortable that this course of action has been chosen to improve this problem," said Karin Manwaring, the attorney representing AQMD.

If this is so, fried fish and chow mein could return to the Base Line Road market soon.

"Smells bad? Market services shrink," said a headline in yesterday's World Journal, a Chinese-language daily.

The article discussed the scaled-down offerings of 99 Ranch, the Base Line Road market that was declared a public nuisance by the South Coast Air Quality Management District last month. Tomorrow morning at 11 a.m., the Hearing Board will meet on the matter again.

A five-member board had ordered the Asian grocer to hire an environmental consultant after neighbors complained of extremely strong cooking odors. The consultant was to outline solutions and present them to the Hearing Board tomorrow.

A South Coast Air Quality Management District panel said yesterday that 99 Ranch's cooking odors was a public nuisance.

Now before you go asking AQMD to declare your ex-husband or that black sheep in the family a nuisance, consider the district's definition. Also known by the air pollution control agency as Rule 402, a nuisance is thus defined:

A person shall not discharge from any source whatsoever such quantities of air contaminants or other material which cause injury, detriment, nuisance, or annoyance to any considerable number of persons or to the public, or which endanger the comfort, repose, health or safety of any such persons or the public, or which cause, or have a natural tendency to cause, injury or damage to business or property.The provisions of this rule shall not apply to odors emanating from agricultural operations necessary for the growing of crops or the raising of fowl or animals.

99 Ranch Market is known for its wide selection of fish, some of which still swim in the store's tanks. But does the store sell herring, particularly the red variety?

At the South Coast Air Quality Management District hearing yesterday, when the hearing board declared that 99 Ranch created a public nuisance, the red herring idiom cropped up on a couple of occasions.

The market argued that its neighbor Bobaland, a tea shop and eatery that opened within weeks of 99 Ranch's opening, is another source of odor.

But the AQMD attorney Karin Manwaring said inspectors ruled out Bobaland after several visits.

"Bobaland is nothing more than a red herring," she said.

Earlier in the hearing, the store's general manager testified that without the ability to barbecue and fry foods, the hot deli and seafood departments would no longer be viable. Philip Gonzales said without the two departments, the whole market would close.

But Manwaring pointed out there are stores in the 99 Ranch chain without a hot deli and they are still viable.

99 Ranch's attorney Byron Gee did not like that argument.

"By suggesting that some 99 Ranch does not have a hot deli and remains viable ... that is a red herring," he said.

Gee said the deli-less 99 Ranch stores are located in ethnic neighborhoods where there is a "captive audience" of Asian shoppers.

"Such conditions do not exist in Rancho Cucamonga," he said.

So there you go, red herring all over the place. Maybe the attorneys thought they were before a herring board.

By the way, red herring, the idiom has its own Wikipedia page, which states there is no such fish called the red herring. But if 99 Ranch sold such a fish, you would not be able to get it deep fried. At least not until July when the hearing board meets on this issue again.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District hearing board has declared that 99 Ranch Market's cooking operations created a public nuisance. The board has ordered the market to cook using the methods of steaming and boiling only until a consultant is hired to conduct a thorough study. While the consultant drafts a report, the market could barbecue and deep fry only for the purposes of this study.

On July 13, the board will meet again to determine what 99 Ranch needs to do next.

Today was day 3 of the hearing and it was the first time we heard the opinions of the five-member board.

Edward Camarena chairs the AQMD panel.

"An odor no matter how pleasant -- depending on intensity, duration and frequency -- can rise to the point of being offensive," Camarena said. "I believe the odors have caused a nuisance as defined in health and safety code. I also believe there are other odors generated by other cooking operations in the shopping center where 99 Ranch is located but that does not take away from the fact that 99 Ranch has caused a public nuisance."

Another board member, Julie Varon, said she found the neighbors' testimonies "very credible."

You might remember from previous postings on this blog or in the newspaper articles that some residents claimed the smell coming from 99 Ranch was so bad, they couldn't stay outside or open their windows.

"What was most important about their testimony was the level of these odors -- what level these odors are and how it has impacted their lives," Varon said. "This has essentially taken away their ability to enjoy their property and that's the very definition of nuisance."