A local Chinese cultural organization is squaring off against an affordable-housing developer over a long-planned apartment tower for seniors on city land in Chinatown.

The project called Halewai‘olu Senior Residences would serve 155 kupuna households with low incomes and has been planned for six years following a 2014 city request for proposals.

But a clash has recently arisen over fears the 17-story tower — slated for River Street between Kukui Street and Vineyard Boulevard — will channel emissions from a neighboring mortuary’s crematorium to the headquarters of Lum Sai Ho Tong Hawaii, a cultural society that has maintained the Tin Hau Temple next door for 131 years.

Lum Sai Ho Tong previously supported Halewai‘olu after a minimum 40-foot distance between the tower and its property was encouraged by the Honolulu City Council in 2016.

However, Halewai‘olu’s developer, The Michaels Organization, said detailed engineering and architectural work since then resulted in a need to reduce the tower setback to 23 feet from 40.

Howard Lum, vice president of Lum Sai Ho Tong, said the 40-foot setback addressed the concerns of the society, which initially pushed for a 60-foot setback. He said the more narrow setback will allow “effluent” from two incinerators for human remains at Borthwick Mortuary to bounce off the closer makai end of the building toward the society’s property.

“That’s not right,” he said. “Basically, they’re trying to ram it through.”

In an effort to have changes made to the plan, Lum Sai Ho Tong is lobbying City Council members to impose the wider setback.

“As the project’s adjacent neighbor, we support the Halewai‘olu project,” Lum said in a recent letter to Council members. “However, we are strongly opposed to its changed design and the manner in which it has come about.”

The City Council will soon consider whether to approve the project as part of a process that includes public hearings.

Karen Seddon, regional vice president of New Jersey-based Michaels, said the company earnestly tried to set the tower back 40 feet from the society’s property line but couldn’t achieve that without rendering the $93.6 million project financially unfeasible.

City zoning rules for the site don’t require any setback for what is considered the side of the property, and Seddon said that even with a 23-foot setback, the tower would be 73 feet from the Lum Sai Ho Tong building.

“They don’t want this project,” she said. “We’ve done everything we can do at this point.”

Lum Sai Ho Tong officials said they support affordable senior housing that doesn’t degrade the use of their property.

Eddie Flores Jr., a Lum Sai Ho Tong board director and owner of the L&L Drive-Inn chain, who grew up in the nearby Kukui Gardens affordable-housing project, said senior housing on the city site would help people and improve a section of Chinatown that some view as rather seedy.

“The affordable housing — we are for it — it’s good for the community,” he said. “But (Michaels) just changed their plan without telling us.”

In an environmental report published in August, Michaels contends that its final tower plan won’t exacerbate emissions from the neighboring crematorium and that an odor study conducted in November by Trinity Consultants for Michaels assessed potential emissions impacts on six nearby sites: Lum Sai Ho Tong, Mun Lun School, Chinese Cultural Plaza, Izumo Taishakyo Mission, Kuan Yin Temple and Foster Botanical Garden.

The study concluded that potential odors would be reduced at four sites and not affected at the other two.

“The project is expected to have an overall long-term net benefit to odor nuisance in the area,” the report said.

Borthwick operates its crematorium under a permit from the Clean Air Branch of the state Department of Health.

Jay Morford, president of Borthwick parent Hawaiian Memorial Life Plan Ltd., said the crematorium operates in compliance with regulations.

“There are no harmful emissions that come out,” he said. “They are clean emissions.”

Lum Sai Ho Tong calls the developer’s study deeply flawed and doesn’t accept the clean-emissions claim.

“You ever smell human remains burning?” Lum asked. “It’s a very weird smell. It can be quite obnoxious.”

Clarence Lau, a feng shui master, said it’s not only smoke that is disturbing. He said a chi, or energy, will be directed from the crematorium’s two 29-foot smokestacks to the three-story Lum Sai Ho Tong property where people meet and pray.

The society, in an Oct. 7 letter to the city Department of Land Management, contends the study should have involved a wind tunnel analysis using a scale model and on-site meteorological measurements.

“(The tower) will likely impede the flow of the crematorium emissions, thereby exposing the project’s occupants and neighbors, including (Lum Sai Ho Tong), and the general public of Chinatown, to harmful air quality,” the letter said.

The odor study, according to Michaels, used a mathematical emission dispersion model that is superior to a wind tunnel analysis and is from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, while general wind conditions were based on meteorological data from 1986 to 2016 measured at Honolulu International Airport.

Seddon said it’s difficult to dispel the notion that emissions from a crematorium operated properly make air quality bad.

“There’s a perceived problem that doesn’t exist,” she said.

Even so, Michaels decided to equip every Halewai‘olu unit with air conditioning as one of the design changes to address the perception of harmful or unpleasant air from Borthwick. Tenants in the building will be able to open windows if they want.

If Michaels succeeds, it will fulfill a more than decade-old city vision to shelter a needy population on the site acquired by the city in 1992.

In 2009 then-Mayor Mufi Hannemann attempted to redevelop the site as 100-unit rental housing project aimed at the area’s chronically homeless population. Strong community opposition, however, upended that plan.

Under Mayor Kirk Caldwell, the city offered a 65-year lease to a developer to produce housing for low-income seniors. Michaels was selected over one other bidder.

Since an initial conceptual plan was presented, Michaels added five units to the tower, reduced the makai setback, created airways in the parking podium and reduced parking at the city’s request.

Monthly rents for units with one or two bedrooms including utilities are projected to range from $708 to $2,268. Units would be reserved for people age 62 and older mainly with incomes up to 60% of the median for Honolulu, which equates to $52,920 for a single person or $60,480 for a couple.

Eight units would be reserved for households earning no more than 30% of the median, and 16 units would be for tenants earning up to 80% of the median.

A 10,400-square-foot community center on the first floor is also part of the plan and would be open to the public.

Last year Michaels obtained approval to receive about $90 million in tax-exempt bonds, a loan and tax credits through a state agency. Michaels also is seeking $1.4 million in city fee waivers.

If Michaels is allowed to proceed, construction could begin as early as May and be finished in early 2023.