If it's not a hog farm, crematorium or the Great Salt Lake, it's cows, trash or even a coffeehouse causing people to ask, "What stinks?"
When a smell turns foul, lingers too long, is unidentifiable or becomes too much for too many noses, the question becomes: Is human health at risk?
In Stansbury Park, some residents living near an asphalt plant have said it brings foul smells and even illness into their homes. One family reportedly moved because of it.
"This is not just a Tooele problem," said Nicole Cline, county planner and zoning administrator. "This is an issue that's been around for quite some time."
True.
Residents offended by the odors emanating from the Kuhni rendering plant in Provo say they'd like to see it moved. Kuhni is the only facility in the state that turns animal carcasses and butcher scraps into products such as soap and animal feed.
So many homeowners in West Point griped about the smell of livestock that the City Council decided last month that police would no longer respond to such complaints. In Salt Lake City, residents recently flooded police dispatchers with worries of gas leaks and strange smells when it was nothing more than the Great Salt Lake going about the business of being a great big salty, sometimes smelly lake.
Those who live in the Spanish Fork Ranch development, built over an old landfill, say a foul smell permeates the air on some days. The Utah County Board of Health has ordered the homes moved by June 1. In Taylorsville, neighbors of a crematorium and nearby coffeehouse are divided on which one is causing a stink there.
And in Heber City, hundreds of residents turned out to a meeting last fall to oppose a proposed asphalt plant, complaining about, among other things, the potential stench.
The Tooele County Commission recently adopted an ordinance requiring all future extraction industries, such as gravel pits, mining operations and asphalt plants, to locate at least half a mile from the nearest residential zone. But the mandate has one important limitation.
"The ordinance does not protect against odors," Cline said. "There's no way to regulate an odor."
But is there more in the air than an odor?
Air-quality studies have shown trace amounts of harmful substances coming from the plant in Erda, across from Stansbury Park, but not enough, so far, to shut the plant down, Cline said. Sometimes the smell in the air may actually be coming from a large chicken egg farm to the south, she said.
And don't discount the power of suggestion. It's possible that illnesses perceived to have been caused by fumes from the plant may be psychosomatic, Cline said.
Deborah J. Weibe, an assistant professor of health psychology at the University of Utah, has a few theories of her own. "We know things about how we think, evaluate and perceive, and those are heavily influenced by the psychological process," she said.
For example, if you give people a list of symptoms associated with high blood pressure, some will begin experiencing symptoms they think are directly related to high blood pressure, she said.
But don't tell Stansbury Park resident Carol Gallup that it's all in her head — or that the nearby asphalt plant isn't making her and her family sick.
She is upset that the plant is ready to renew its five-year conditional-use permit in May. "I'm afraid because I cannot raise my children in my home because of that asphalt plant," Gallup said. "It's kind of hard when it's your home you're fighting for." But she hopes a court decision will ultimately force Staker to move their hot-mix operations, which some say is the main source of the stink.
Gallup, who has seven children at home, has been the most vocal critic of the plant, run by Staker Paving and Construction. Staker leases the property from Pacific West, also a user of the controversial hot-mix asphalt. Gallup believes air-quality tests were inaccurate because the samples were not taken when the odor was the strongest.
"We've done a lot of things trying to eliminate any possible odors, and we're still doing that," said Jay Harwood, a managing member of Pacific West. Tests have shown that the plant was operating well within compliance on environmental issues and that some people were noticing a smell on days when there were no hot-mix operations, he said. Some odors, he suspects, are coming from the egg farm, the Great Salt Lake or even Kennecott Utah Copper Corp.
"I think the Staker plant near Stansbury is really just one example of many problems that exist throughout the state of situations where we have quite frankly different land uses located too closely together," said Rick Sprott, director of the Utah Division of Air Quality. "This is not an easy dilemma to solve."
In rural Milford, Beaver County, residents have complained about odor coming from Circle Four Farms, a large hog operation there.
The state, however, cannot shut down an operation unless there is a clear and imminent danger. A stench is not enough. "The Division of Air Quality does not regulate odors," Sprott said.
And because noses are actually more sensitive than the state's analytical instruments, "it's often a nuisance problem before it's a health problem."
So what's a homeowner to do?
How about fighting smell with smell?
"There are oils that help keep the respiratory system healthy," said aromatherapist Susan Sharp. Sharp suggested using a natural, botanical oil she called an "essential" oil. Although it may have a pleasant fragrance, its purpose is less for masking odor than it is for helping counter the effects of harmful airborne substances.
"I guess I just think I shouldn't have to do that," Gallup said. "I shouldn't have to get a counter odor. I just think it's a basic human right for everyone to have clean air to breathe."
E-mail: sspeckman@desnews.com