The Oak Harbor Safeway has just days to comply with a letter of abatement from Island County about the smell of seagull feces coming through the ventilation system.

Due to Safeway’s possible procrastination of these orders, at a recent meeting leaders of both the city and the county considered steps of enforcement. Officials discussed pulling the food permits if Safeway doesn’t comply, though the store would still remain open and able to sell pre-packaged food items.

Safeway management declined to comment.

The first week of August brought in over 35 complaints of the smell of seagull feces in the store, said Heather Korteum, the county environmental health manager. The county assessed the situation and discovered the vent system had a door on the roof that was open wide.

“It’s literally just sucking air off dead baby seagulls and all the other detritus that was up there, so that’s the smell that’s blowing directly into the meat department,” Kortuem said.

According to Dr. Howard Leibrand, the county health officer, this poses the risk of psittacosis, influenza and E. coli.

“This is not just a smell, although that nuisance certainly is present. I think this is potential risk, and no way to assess the risk,” he said, “and certainly a departure from engineering guidelines for that system it sounds like, so I think we need to minimize the risk as much as we can.”

In early August, the county told Safeway to repair the system or shut it off.

On Aug. 19, more complaints rolled in, Kortuem said. County staff returned to Safeway to find that nothing had changed.

“We took identical photos again on the 19th,” she said. “Nothing had been done. Even the door hadn’t been put back on.”

On Aug. 22, the county shut down Safeway’s ability to use the fryer, though inspectors were unsure if it was directly related to the ventilation, as the city of Oak Harbor oversees building code enforcement.

Brian Colbert, Oak Harbor’s building official, requested a letter from an engineer confirming that the fryer was unrelated to the central ventilation system.

On Aug. 23, Leibrand issued an order of abatement, giving Safeway 10 days to clean the roof and 30 days to install seagull deterrents.

Safeway booked a contractor to clean the roof within 10 days, but the contractor was not able to make that deadline. Further, Safeway continued to use the fryer as recently as last Tuesday, Korteum said.

On Wednesday, Safeway returned a letter to the city confirming from an engineer that the fryer is unrelated to the central ventilation system.

According to Kortuem, this is not satisfactory.

“It satisfies what we need to get their deli cooking chicken again,” she said. “What it doesn’t satisfy is protecting the air that the employees and customers are breathing that’s being sucked off that nasty roof and pulled down in.”

Since the county’s only leverage is food licensing and not building code, the city must inspect the building and inform the county if it should pull the food permit, said Commissioner Jill Johnson.

According to Mayor Ronnie Wright, the city was frustrated about this process because Wright was not aware of this situation until a public meeting on Tuesday, although members of his staff have known for nearly a month, and the News-Times sent questions to his administration regarding this issue on Aug. 29 that were never answered.

Now working jointly, city and county staff assessed the work of the contractor on Friday, Sept. 20. If the work is satisfactory, the health officer will lift the order.

If it is not, the city and county will give a joint letter, as it is a building maintenance problem contributing to a public health issue. This letter will give Safeway until Sept. 23, as that was the deadline of the original abatement letter. If Safeway still has not complied, the county will likely pull the store’s food permit.

“We got people walking in there with the expectation that they’re in a safe environment,” Johnson said. “They’re not, so we’re trying to figure out with all these different lanes of jurisdictions. I mean I appreciate that they can be compliant with (Oak Harbor) rules. They still don’t have a safe environment to shop in.”