CLAREMONT, S.D.(Aberdeen Insider) — A plan to haul liquid beef tallow to Claremont and ship it out on rail cars has met substantial opposition.

About 40 local residents attended a community meeting at the city hall on Thursday, July 11 and made it clear they aren’t keen on the idea. Their primary concern is that the tanker trucks hauling the tallow from DemKota Ranch Beef in Aberdeen to the rail line in Claremont will damage streets in town.

Parts of two city streets leading to the tracks are posted as not allowing trucks. They are Third Street, which enters town from County Road 9 to the north, and  Sixth Avenue, which primarily runs along the tracks from southwest to southeast. Third Street is gravel.

Scott Vincent of Strobel Energy Logistics was at the meeting, but was not warmly greeted. He said it’s likely five trucks would run through Claremont each day to unload tallow. That would generally happen between the hours of 7 a.m. and 5 p.m., he said.

Vincent is the director of logistics and director of environmental, health and safety for Strobel.

The city streets can’t handle that many heavy loads, Claremont residents said. Furthermore, the city recently finished a big water project and doesn’t want that underground infrastructure damaged, they said.

Vincent said Third Street wasn’t posted when he first visited with city officials. It is now.

He said that in previous conversations with city leaders, Sheriff Dave Lunzman and Brown County Highway Department Superintendent Dirk Rogers, a route to the tracks using Third Street and Sixth Avenue was agreed to. The details are outlined in a preliminary map dated June 21.

On that map, trucks would enter Claremont from the north on Third Street and exit to the west on Sixth Avenue. That was what city officials asked for after a previous proposal, Vincent said.

He said Rogers didn’t take issue with the current plan.

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