For two decades a crematory with a high smokestack has overshadowed a quiet residential neighborhood in the Town of Tonawanda.
Working with the Clean Air Coaltion residents of Werkeley Road are asking State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to shut down the Amigone Funeral Home crematory as a public nuisance.
The coalition has collected 300 postcards to Schneiderman to ask for the shutdown.
During a news conference Monday, residents spoke of being sealed into their homes by the odor and mysterious dust which drifts down on the community which they blame on the funeral home.
UB and DEC researchers have found crematory particulates on neighborhood sites and in the exhaust fan of the smokestack.
"If I would have had any idea that was there I never would have considered moving here and starting a family," said neighborhood resident Ronald Gniadowski.
"I've noticed the smells early on when I first moved here but could never see what it was. My neighbor, before they moved, cut down their tree and when they cut it down then I got a clear line of sight to a big smokestack and realized that was where the smells had been coming from."
No one from Amigone was available Monday night but in the past officials have said there is no problem and it would be too expensive to move the operation.
