Due to air pollution and concerns about possible explosions from residents and public officials, there will be a public hearing on the proposed Perdue soybean-crushing plant in Conoy Township.

The Dec. 13 hearing, however, won't be in Conoy Township.

The state Department of Environmental Protection will hold the hearing in Hellam Township, across the Susquehanna River in York County.

That mystifies and miffs Conoy Township supervisors.

Adding to their dissatisfaction, the DEP scheduled the hearing on the night the supervisors will hold their monthly meeting.

"I am writing to protest on behalf of Conoy Township's governing body and residents," Matthew Creme Jr., the township's solicitor, wrote to DEP.

"This scheduling constitutes a denial of an opportunity to be heard by those most directly affected by this application and offends administrative due process be accorded Conoy Township's supervisors and its residents."

Supervisors requested that the hearing date and place be changed.

DEP spokeswoman Lisa Kasianowitz said Wednesday that the hearing has been published in the Pennsylvania Bulletin and it is too late to change the meeting date or place.

She said written comments can be made until Dec. 17 by Conoy officials and residents unable to make the meeting. They will be given just as much weight as those testifying at the hearing, she said.

Kasianowitz also said the hearing was set up for Hellam Township because supervisors and residents there were the first to request a hearing and offered a large space for the hearing.

She said she was not aware of the conflict with Conoy supervisors meeting on the same evening at the time the decision was made to hold the hearing.

Hellam supervisors and residents have voiced more concerns about the proposed $59 million Perdue AgriBusiness facility than their counterparts in Conoy Township.

Hellam's website has posted information supplied by plant opponents and a form that requested DEP hold an "open microphone comment" public hearing.

Of the three dozen comments -- mostly critical -- DEP has received so far about Perdue's application, almost all are from Hellam Township, Kasianowitz said.

But Conoy Supervisor Gina Mariani, for one, doesn't think that makes sense.

"I just don't understand where their thinking was," she said, referring to DEP. "If they wanted to have a hearing on this, you would assume they would come to where it was to be built."

As for the inadvertent scheduling of the hearing when township supervisors meet, she added, "Next time, they need to do a little homework. They never contacted the township at all."

DEP regulations require a public hearing be held if there is public interest in an air quality permit or a plan approval, Kasianowitz said.

"In this case, we received significant public interest so we are holding the hearing," she said.

Regulations do not require that a public hearing be held in a facility's home community, though she said most of the time that is the case.

The Dec. 13, hearing will be held from 6 to 8:30 p.m. at the Hellam Fire Company Hall, 163 E. Market St., Hellam.

• Comments will be taken on three separate applications:

• DEP's draft approval of Perdue's application to install grain elevator operations and their air emissions.

• Perdue's application for a soybean oil extraction facility and air emissions.

• Perdue's plans to install holding tanks containing hexane.

The tanks holding hexane, a federally classified hazardous air pollutant and flammable solvent used to separate oil from soybean meal, have generated the most concerns from the public.

An analysis by a company hired by Conoy Township winery owner Judy Nissley, Blasting Analysis International, concluded that tanks holding hexane were too close and posed an explosion hazard to plant workers, surrounding residents and the county incinerator.

Perdue and a consulting firm it hired, ENVIRON International, said the report was full of errors and that hexane storage would be safe.

Kasianowitz said DEP and Perdue would give a presentation on the project and hexane storage at the outset of the hearing.

DEP and Perdue officials will not be responding to testimony, she said.

Those planning to present oral testimony should register by calling Dawne Wilkes at 705-4702.

For those unable to attend the meeting, written comments about the storage tank application may be e-mailed to tanks@pa.gov. They also can be mailed to Eric Lingle, DEP Bureau of Environmental Cleanup and Brownfields, Division of Storage Tanks, P.O. Box 8762, Harrisburg, Pa., 17105.

For comments on the air quality applications, written comments should be submitted to Thomas Hanlon, DEP Air Quality, South-Central Regional Office, 909 Elmerton Ave., Harrisburg, Pa., 17110.

The deadline for comments is Dec. 17.

acrable@lnpnews.com