Why is it?

You know, we had our “meeting of the minds” a week ago Monday.  One of the things discussed was making the noise louder during the day and lighter at night.  Ridiculous that we even had to hear those words, but what is more ridiculous is that Maola is not even living up to that end of the bargain.  At 3:30pm yesterday, the noise was apparent, but not overbearing.  At 8pm, they had two trucks going and it was so loud.  Noticibly louder than at 3:30pm.  Is Maola just thumbing their noses at the Riverside Community?  While we would like to say the answer is no, it is really starting to look like they just dont care one bit. 

What happened to the weekly meetings our spokespeople, the city of New Bern, and Maola were supposed to have?  Everyone except Riverside seems unreachable.  Seems like all parties involved would want to bury the hatchet and do the right thing for the city.

It might be time for the media to do a recap.  See where we are.

The Laughable Poll

So, the Sun Journal (who has been a great source for the Riverside Residents) has a poll up that is worded questionably. 

“Who do you side with — Maola, which has been in its commercial district and operating since the 1930s, or nearby residents, who say a recent increase in noise from the company’s trucks are harming their way of life?”

Are you kidding?  I encourage you to go vote on the residents behalf.  It’s like saying “Would you rather rip a chicken breast out of a starving child’s hands…or eat it yourself?”. 

Please go vote.  I did receive an email from somone who sent the Sun Jounal an email.  I am going to post it for you.  

Dear Editor — I am very disappointed in the ‘editorial framing’ The 
Sun Journal has done in their current ‘poll’ regarding Maola Dairy’s 
noise pollution.  Firstly there should be no ‘sides’ in this issue.  
There is in fact city ordnances stating ‘reasonable people’ should 
not have to live with unreasonable noise.  Maola has been a good 
neighbor since the 1930′s — OK; however, so has the Riverside 
community, which predates Maola by decades.  The real issue is the 
recent change in operations – one that has pit saving a few dollars 
at the expense of residences.  Maola has been an excellent Riverside 
partner over the years, but recent changes seem to overshadow that 
legacy.  In order to truly evaluate the situation readers need to 
deprive themselves of sleep for a few weeks, now months.  Obviously 
the ‘poll designer’ decided it would be more provocative to have the 
issue ‘framed’ in a ‘us verses them’ fashion.  In my opinion — it’s 
a cheap shot — we are all neighbors and we should all be concerned 
about each other as human beings.   The noise problem has a number of  solutions none of which are very difficult.  It is my understanding 
Maola is working on it — so they should.

Letter to the Editor in the Sun Journal

Respecting Riverside residents

Is it too much to ask for the decency or human rights to live, have a family and live in a small town as New Bern?

Is it too much to ask that those that come here and take over or begin businesses be responsible and respectful of our town?

Some of us have been here for decades, others have moved here because we love this town, or retired, or family has brought us here or perhaps our jobs. However, we come here with an intimate love of our city and a respect for what it stands for and what it has meant for those before us, and for what it will become in the future.

We have invested ourselves in our livelihoods and invested ourselves in this community. We love our town.

We value that we live in an area of North Carolina unlike no other, that is proud to boast its historical and family values and we expect nothing less in return of our residents and our commercial businesses.

Now, I am not a resident of Riverside, but is it too much to ask for those that live in Riverside, a historical district, to live in peace? Does money for a milk plant come before all of the health and well being of the children and families that live there? Are those families’ contributions to our town not as important as those of Maola? Please tell me I am wrong in that.

I come to you subjectively, however, after educating myself, I know that if anyone of us, outside of our quiet peaceful New Bern homes lived there, we would be in distress.

Can you imagine having a newborn or a young child and dealing with that noise 24 hours a day? Can your kids play outside? Can you sleep at night? What about the older folks who live there? Are they comfortable? The answer is no.

I have put myself in that place and I ask of the New Bern residents, to take some time, evaluate what is going on and be compassionate. I also ask that of Maola.

Where is your compassion or dedication to New Bern and what we stand for? We have been here with you through the years but we ask for your respect for our families as we would have for your own, as well as for our community. There is a common ground.

Maola has been here since the 1930s. We treasure you. But with the new ownership, the 24-hour schedules and the noise that has started as of May, it is too much to bear. Please have the love for your own family that the residents of Riverside have for theirs and allow them to live in their homes that they love, with peace.

Let us keep living with respect and admiration for our fine town and preserve what most have lost in this big world.

-New Bern Resident

Breaktime is Over.

To be fair, we decided to step away from the blog to give the folks at Maola ample time to come up with a solution to help the Riverside Community, which is suffering from noise pollution. Also, it might be good to mention that we have comments set for approval because we were getting slanderous messages and while we encourage speaking your mind, we ask that this forum be used as a place to come and find out the latest information and a place to add valid points and concerns.

Where do we stand? It will be a week tomorrow that everyone met down at the church. What has been done since last Monday to alleviate the aggravation and noise pollution?
Firstly, the Maola officials took care of the employee noise issues and parking issues.
In that meeting, Maola mentioned a fan that they were going to try and use to suck the cold air onto the trucks, rather than using those horribly loud cooling systems. The fan didn’t work.
Maola also mentioned that they were going to move some empty trucks to create a “temporary buffer”. They moved three trucks that are parallel to N. Pasteur St. It is creating a minor buffer on the lower level of our homes. If you go upstairs, the noise is unbearable, still.
They have put up black plastic on the fence – we’re not sure if it was just so we couldn’t look in, we hope that they weren’t thinking that plastic would stop the noise.

Noise levels are still registering in the mid 60′s which is totally unacceptable. We want to see a noise ordinance in place. This is the only way to hold anyone accountable.

We also would like a time line for a resolution. This is not a ridiculous request. We have been forced to deal with this noise for a over a month now.

There will be a meeting with city officials, the Riverside representatives, and Maola this week and we will post the findings of that meeting.

Tomorrow, look for more pictures and videos.

Noise Level

The noise level has been noticeably better today. We haven’t seen the Maola folks but they did get their fan in yesterday so we can only guess that they have been testing it all day. Here’s hoping it nets them good results.

Disappointing Day

This morning started out so positive. The folks at Maola moved in trucks as a “temporary buffer”. Here is a picture of what they are doing

While we do appreciate the effort, there are some clinks in this plan. It’s still louder than 60Db and now the folks who live on the corner of Pasteur and Ave D are getting the noise tunneled to them even more so.

So, basically today, they moved trucks as a makeshift buffer, however they never finished the job. We were told they were going to use  canvas to block the corner where the sound is being funneled and along the bottom of the trucks-but it never happened. Disappointing.

Questions that were asked in last nights meeting that were tossed to the side:

Q:Why cant you just get new trucks…you say you have increased productivity by 20 percent in one year…surely you made plans for growth, and not at the residents expense…
A: No answer

Q: Can we have a timeline?
A: Maola’s lawyer told told us it was “ridiculous to expect a time line just like the Iraq war”…huh?

Maola’s suggestion was to run the older Thermo King units during the day and newer ones at night, with the thought being the older ones are louder (so just torture the folks who stay at home during the day). But, 8:30pm and there was an old unit running.

Still hoping for a reprieve

To be fair, we are happy to report that Mayola officials have moved the trailers on the Pasteur Side of the street alleviating a portion of the noise that has been taking over our neighborhood. While this isn’t a permanent fix, we do realize the show of good faith that it is. They have even put trucks on the Avenue D side as well, giving those neighbors some assistance.

We are glad that Maola officials are communicating with us. As a community, we all appreciate it.
UPDATE: We want to make it clear that the sound is still horrendous and unbearable. Just seeing some action over at Maola is welcoming. Let’s hope that big fan they spoke of last night is going to help. It’s a fan that sucks the refrigeration out of the plant and into the trailers and it would allow them to turn their therma king units off.

More Press

Read the full story, click here: Sun Journal.

Where is the Action?

I am absolutely livid as I write this. I am not going to go into details of the meeting until I have calmed down. But I want it known that it is 11:30pm, we had our meeting and the Db reading on my porch, RIGHT NOW is 70!

I really wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt. This sector of the Historic Riverside Community has compromised our lives in the past month and tonight if just one “simple solution” could have gone into effect, it would have been a show of good corporate citizenship.

But nothing was implemented that would give us immediate relief-NOTHING
There was even a solution that was shared with the group, that would provide immediate relief to several of the highly affected areas-placing empty Maola trailers in the vacant lot adjacent to the loading docks creating a make-shift sound barrier.

In fact, they did a test this afternoon and found that it did indeed make a huge difference on the noise.

But, here we sit feeling physically ill, wide awake with the relentless noise, and NO ONE THOUGHT THE SITUATION WAS URGENT ENOUGH TO CREATE THIS BARRIER TONIGHT — I WANT TO KNOW WHY!!!

In fact, in the meeting tonight they were asked when they would pull the trailers up, would it be tonight, would it be 24 hours or 48 hours.

Sadly, for everyone involved, the answer we got was…we aren’t sure when we can do that.

Let’s Be Very Clear

The Riverside Neighborhood issue is NOT with Maola operating in our neighborhood, nor is it with the police not acknowledging the noise issue.

The problem is with the New Bern city noise ordinance and how it is written. The ordinance is vague and is left to interpretation; ‘…any loud, raucous and disturbing noise, which shall mean any sound which because of its volume level, duration and character annoys, disturbs, injures or endangers the comfort, health, peace…’

The residents of Riverside initially met with the Chief of Police, citing the noise ordinance and requested enforcement.

Unfortunately for everyone involved, Maola management deliberately chose to use the vague language of the noise ordinance in their favor, saying that it wasn’t specific to their situation therefore they would not stop. This action tied the hands of the police and has created the situation we are now in.

As complex as it all seems, the solution is simple; a new noise ordinance must be implemented. Many cities throughout the country have done it and in our state, towns like Greenville, Charlotte, Chapel Hill and Greensboro have updated their noise ordinances to include acceptable Db levels.

These new noise ordinances specify acceptable, measurable Db readings that are clearly spelled out and enforceable by the local police dept.

A model of this ordinance exists, it is not arbitrary, it is based on acceptable levels of noise as called out by the EPA.