Submar’s work angers Dunn St. neighbors

A maker of concrete erosion-control mats in Houma received several complaints from nearby residents at the Terrebonne Parish Council’s meeting last week.

Submar, located on Dunn Street next to the Intracoastal Waterway, is in an area zoned light industrial, but residents are complaining about cement dust in the air and large trucks that use the facility riding along residential streets.

The company has begun batching concrete at the site, Submar President Kenneth McAllester told the council. The company previously had used ready-mixed concrete.

Submar moved to the Dunn Street location from Houston in 1983.

“The parish has allowed Submar to build a cement plant in our neighborhood,” said Ted Ponville, a resident of Point Street, which intersects Dunn. “That property is rated industrial light. They should never have been in there ever. There’s so much dirt in the air. You know what Portland cement is like.”

Eugene Dusenberry, who lives across from the facility on Dunn Street, said he has asthma and has to breathe cement dust.

Another Dunn Street resident said 18-wheelers pull up to the facility throughout the night.

John Watson, who lives on High Street, which also intersects Dunn, claimed Submar’s facility is wrongly zoned. He said that since the facility deals with concrete and concrete products, it should be in a heavy industrial zone.

“By allowing them to make concrete, it’s another business,” he told the council. “We have to bring it into code.”

“This upgrade should not be allowed without a zoning change,” he added.

McAllester said trucks go to the Submar facility from Oregon and Texas. The company has no control over them.

“We can’t tell a guy to come over a certain route,” he said. “Every time we get a complaint, we give notice to the trucking company. If they go down Point Street, they will not get paid. I thought it was solved.”

McAllester, who has been president for a year and a half, said the area was zoned in the 1940s.

“We are a concrete company, concrete revetments,” he said.

“This is the first time it was brought to our attention about dust in the neighborhood,” he said. “I’m all for being a good neighbor.”

“We’re an industrial facility located in a residential area,” he told the council.

McAllester said Submar has worked with the Terrebonne Economic Development Authority to find another location around Houma. A possible site at the Port of Terrebonne did not work out.

Councilman Billy Hebert wants to create approved truck routes in Terrebonne Parish.

“These streets cannot handle these (trucks),” he said. “We cannot let them drive, shake people’s homes.”

Councilman Alvin Tillman, whose district contains the Submar facility, will hold a public meeting on the issue today at 11 a.m. on the sixth floor of the Government Tower building (8026 Main St., Houma).

McAllester said the long-time former president of Submar will attend the meeting.

Also at the meeting last week, the council passed $2.5 million in spending from the parish’s Dedicated Emergency Fund to repair levees and structures damaged by hurricanes Gustav and Ike. The parish is using the money as the local match for federal spending on the repair projects.

• 4-1 levee in Pointe-aux-Chenes: $500,000

• Ward 7 levee in Chauvin: $1 million

• Clinton Street Pump Station: $582,000

• Susie Canal/Orange Street levees: $400,000

The council also approved nearly $3 million in emergency spending as the local match for other projects related to hurricane damage, including Bayou Terrebonne tree removal ($101,350); Island Road restoration ($875,000); investigating all pump stations ($75,000); restoration of other roadways ($426,978); and St. Louis Bayou clearing ($242,185).