‘Like death’: Arkansas company to end use of odorous chicken waste lagoon after complaints

Above: A dredge works on the Denali waste lagoon in Van Buren.

After hearing, company commits to timeline to shut down waste lagoon in Van Buren

By Ainsley Platt, Arkansas Advocate

Russellville-based Denali announced Friday that it will stop depositing waste from chicken processing facilities in its Van Buren lagoon by the end of 2025.

The announcement came after dozens of people attended a public hearing at the Alma Community Center near Fort Smith on May 15, where several individuals and elected officials spoke about how pungent odors from land-application operations in the area have affected their lives and region.

“Denali will discontinue bringing material to the storage facility this year,” Denali CEO Todd Mathes said in an emailed press release.

“Disposition of the material at the site will be determined after Dec. 31, 2025. Denali is currently executing its long-term plan for alternative storage capacity and long-term infrastructure solutions throughout the region, which will allow for the closure of the open-air facility in Crawford County,” Mathes said. “Working with regulatory officials to obtain permits and permit modifications are required in order to completely close the storage facility in a timely manner.”

Denali told the Advocate earlier this month that “we have not committed to an exact date,” citing the need to obtain additional storage and permits.

Denali said it would provide notifications to local officials before the lagoon is cleaned out. A previous clean-out of millions of gallons of sludge from the lagoon in 2024 led to dozens of complaints about odor to DEQ from Fort Smith residents.

However, the waste recycling company emphasized that Sebastian and Crawford counties remained “important operational areas” for Denali due to the number of food processors in the region.

A restaurant owner among those who spoke at the hearing in Alma, said he couldn’t use his patio when the odor wafted over Fort Smith. The patio made up 20% of his revenue, he said.

Denali, a waste recycling company that applies waste left over from chicken and other industrial processing, has earned the ire of Sebastian and Crawford County residents due to overpowering odors from a sludge lagoon in Van Buren and considerable increases in the amount of waste it applies to fields in the area.

Now, with one of its Crawford County land application permits up for renewal, that ire was on full display at the hearing held by the Arkansas Division of Environmental Quality. Not one person who spoke during the comment period at last Thursday’s hearing spoke in favor of granting the permit renewal.

The permit
Denali’s application to renew an existing land application permit in Crawford County would add 670 acres of applicable fields to the roughly 1,500 acres already permitted.

Denali has struggled to comply with — and knowingly violated, according to records — its permits in recent months. Starting last year, Denali began land application within 24 hours of predicted rainfall, which is a violation of its permits, despite a rebuke from DEQ’s top water official. That culminated in a $19,800 fine earlier this year, something many residents have called “a slap in the face” for being too low.

The state of Missouri’s decision to disallow Denali from land application on Missouri fields led to an effective doubling of land application volume in Arkansas, according to Arkansas state records. In the same 2024 letter, the company pressed ADEQ to speed up the approval process for multiple pending land application permits.

The hearing
A restaurant owner among those who spoke at the hearing in Alma, said he couldn’t use his patio when the odor wafted over Fort Smith. The patio made up 20% of his revenue, he said.

Michael Gray, a wildlife biologist, said he bought land in the area in 2021 for recreational waterfowl hunting, with the additional hope of restoring the wetlands on it as well. Denali’s land application directly next to his property, he said, had potentially left his wetlands “damaged forever.”

State Rep. Cindy Crawford, R-Fort Smith, also addressed the room, saying that after hearing the comments of area residents, she planned to ask Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders to help, saying, “We can’t do this.”

“Now learning that ADEQ fined the company only $19,000 for repeated violations is a slap in my face since I spent nearly double that” to try to clean up pollution he believes is caused by Denali’s land application practices.

Meanwhile, Neva and Ralph Bogner, who have repeatedly complained to the Division of Environmental Quality about Denali’s permit violations, expressed concerns about the land the company wanted to add to the permit as part of the renewal.

They said they could already smell the waste being applied to the fields two miles away at times, with Ralph Bogner previously describing the smell as one “like death.” If DEQ approves the permit renewal, a new field only a mile away will be available for waste application, Neva Bogner said.

Local officials expressed frustrations with Denali when they took to the microphone, with at-large Fort Smith City Director Christina Catsavis saying the company went back on a 2019 promise that it would shut down the Van Buren lagoon. The smell was impacting the area’s growth and economic prospects, multiple officials said, causing events to be cancelled and outdoor recreation to be unenjoyable.

“These odors are pungent and nauseating,” Catsavis said. “Denali has not demonstrated a responsible approach to their operation, and the history of complaints, legal action and public disruption should weigh heavily against permit renewal.”

Fort Smith Mayor George McGill made similar remarks, adding that the stench had even caught the attention of the F-35 fighter training facility located in the city.

State Rep. Cindy Crawford, R-Fort Smith, also addressed the room, saying that after hearing the comments of area residents, she planned to ask Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders to help, saying, “We can’t do this.”

Nancy LaPierre, a spokesperson for Denali, said assertions by the speakers that Denali did not live in the area or understand the smell were incorrect.

“We live and work here too, right?” she told the Advocate after the hearing. “And the communities are important to us. … We heard everything that folks had to say here. We do have a plan in place that we have been executing and we’ll continue to execute.”

Rep. Brad Hall, R-Alma, wrote Act 1009 of 2025, a new state law that requires DEQ to levy the maximum penalty on future land application violations. After the hearing, he said that while he was optimistic Denali would solve the problem, he was prepared to take further action in the 2027 session if necessary.

“We have a year and a half to come up with different avenues,” Hall said.

A decision has not been made as to whether DEQ will grant the permit renewal.

Friday’s press release from Denali did not address concerns of some critics about the volume of waste being applied to fields in the area nor how land applications were affecting residents living nearby.

Crawford County has one of the highest number of land application permits in the state, with at least eight. Most of the Crawford County permits are held by Denali. HydroAg Environmental is another permit holder.

The Arkansas Advocate is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to tough, fair daily reporting and investigative journalism that holds public officials accountable and focuses on the relationship between the lives of Arkansans and public policy. Image: ADEQ file via Arkansas Advocate