Shortly after the turnoff from Highway 2 about 15 kilometres south of Nampa, one passes a yellow Children Playing sign on the right hand side of the dirt road. Shortly after that, the towering black storage tanks start appearing, grouped together and containing bitumen- some venting, others equipped with a flaring system through which excess gas is burned off, some with a gas gathering system in place to minimize what joins the atmosphere.

Interspersed throughout this area are residences, mostly belonging to that of the Labrecque family - Andy Labrecque, who still lives in the area with his wife Joyce - amongst much of their extended family, bought the land at 18-years old through what was then known as a homestead sale.

A little farther down the road is metal side-paneling hanging from a fence and off poplar trees with spray-painted red lettering reading: 'Baytex we deserve clean air' and 'forced evacuations in progress.'

One of those so-called 'forced evacuations' is Alain and Karla Labrecque, who have lived in the area since Koch Exploration first developed the property and sold it to Prosper Petroleum, which drilled more wells before it was purchased by Baytex Energy in February 2011. Since entering the picture, Baytex has drilled five wells, adding to the approximate 41 total in the area.

The Labrecque's say the air quality is affecting their lives and causing negative health symptoms. Baytex's Chief Operating Officer Marty Proctor, who has visited the area himself, says the air quality there is better than what he experiences in Calgary, though the company remains concerned. The Energy Resources Conservation Board (ERCB) has dispatched a dispute-resolution team to act as a mediator between the residents and the company.

Alain and Karla and their young children began to experience health problems in Dec. 2010, before Baytex purchased the property, and say they tried to attribute it to everything else before the surrounding development.

"I spent so long trying to blame it on ourselves, our house. You just keep eliminating all of what it could be of our stuff," Alain told the Record-Gazette.

According to Karla, they could not have fathomed having any negative from the industry they believe is vital to the economy.

"We were excited when the oil came, this was on his Dad's land. We were very excited when it first started coming around. Right on, your Dad's getting some oil activity, right? Never dreamt it would cause this. Never."

By March 2011 though, Alain and Karla's process of elimination left nothing else to blame.

"We figured out what it was. It was the smell. Whenever the smell was bad, the day after we had symptoms," Karla said.

Karla suffered from almost constant headaches, would sometimes lose her balance, and if she turned her head to far the left, dizziness would overcome her to the point of almost passing out, she explained. She went to a doctor who put her on decongestants for two months thinking it was a problem with her ears. With no change in her symptoms she went to a specialist who attributed it to her sinus', which were red, thought there was no pus or mucus build-up.

This never went away.

According to Alain, he didn't realize his symptoms were symptoms until the family moved out of their home, one year after they started noticing issues.

"The biggest symptom that was more crippling for me as far as inhibiting was muscle and back spasms, soreness in the muscles, hurting knees. It would just ache like nothing," he said.

"That all cleared up in about a month (after moving out). It all went away."

As did Karla's headaches.

"In November I was taking four to eight Advil a day trying to get rid of the headaches and I just kept blaming it on migraines because I get migraines, but part of you knows it's not.

"But I've taken maybe eight Advil since we left, in total," she said.

The couple also noticed impacts on their children.

"We didn't realize it until after we moved out that our little boy had dark grey circles under his eyes, like bags. He doesn't have them anymore.

"And Kandace, while you'd think oh klutzy two-and-a-half-year-old kid, she should be sitting eating supper and she'd just fall off her chair," Karla said.

Currently the Labrecques are living in one of their rental houses in Nampa, refusing to go back to their property until something is done.

And that desired 'something' varies from the frustrated residents of the rural community between temporarily shutting down operations while improvements can be made, a completely enclosed system (where no venting or flaring is required), to wanting Baytex out of the area completely.

Alain's uncle, Mike Labrecque and his wife have already left their home to live somewhere else; his cousin Robert is scoping somewhere he can move his mobile home, telling the Record-Gazette he has a nine-year-old daughter he does not want to get sick; Andy (the original homesteader) and Joyce tell the Record-Gazette that they feel pushed into a corner.

"Everything is on hold," Joyce said.

"Your life has stopped. He (a neighbour) wanted to fix his little cabin. We wanted to fix ours too. Our nephew wanted to build a shop. Everything is at a stand-still. He (Andy) has a brother who can't even come back to his farm."

Just last week Andy, who works part time in the concrete business, left the area with a burning tongue in the morning, which went away throughout the day, to only feel the impacts upon his return.

"You could literally put me in a dark box, travel me for hours and when you get into my area I can tell you when I'm there. I can feel it just like that," Andy said.

Donald Labrecque lives 320 metres from a flare stack and 416 metres (he measured) from the closest of 16 tanks with his pregnant wife Erin and 16-month-old son. He says he has had a sore throat for the last two months, and wants the operations to stop.

"Have them shut down," he said in a phone interview in response to what he would ideally like to see.

"We all use oil products every day and we definitely need it, but its got to be done in an enclosed system and I know there's going to need to be money invested but it has to be done that way, especially if it's going to be near residents," he said.

Some of the bigger players in the industry have adjusted their systems to reduce the need for venting and flaring during production by installing vapour recovery systems on tanks or a cogeneration system where excess gas, rather than being released to the atmosphere, is recycled into electricity that can be fed into the grid.

These types of measures though, are above regulation.

According to Darin Barter with ERCB Communications, it is important that whether or not a company is within regulation (which ultimately comes from the provincial government to the ERCB by way of acts and legislation), that they take into account the people they work beside.

"The company (Baytex) is actually in compliance with regulations. Having said that, it is really important that the company look at alternate measures to work in a community. And they've done that but I think they need to continue looking at those concerns and keep working with the residents to address these types of concerns," Barter told the Record-Gazette by phone.

But above a new directive from government, or the ERCB's ability to alter technical regulations to improve conservation or public safety, it comes down to the responsibility of the company to make changes.

"That's why we encourage the companies to go the extra mile if that's what it takes to resolve issues," Barter said, and adds this is part of the dispute-resolution team's work: looking at ways the company can implement new technology or equipment to go above and beyond.

So far the air monitoring that has been conducted in that area by Baytex, Alberta Environment and the ERCB has shown levels that are within the Alberta Ambient Air Quality Guidelines. The ERCB has set up air monitoring specifically for poisonous gases' sulphur dioxide, h2s as well as sour gas and found none.

But more testing is on its way.

The ERCB will be conducting a resident-directed surveillance where they will set up monitors where the worst odours are. Baytex has committed to do a comprehensive air quality study both in the summer and winter to gather numbers.

Proctor of Baytex assures the Record-Gazette that the company is working on the problem and wants to work with the residents to find a solution, though says that requests to shut down operations are unreasonable.

In a phone interview with the Record-Gazette from his office in Calgary, the Baytex executive said he has personally sat down with Alain and Karla as well as Donald and Erin to try and reach a solution.

"I don't think that's reasonable or fair. We've made a number of improvements since we bought the property versus how it was operated before, and we're continuing to work diligently to improve how things are operated.

"So shutting in everything is not a solution that is acceptable."

Since making the purchase off Prosper, Baytex has connected the wells with a gathering system to use the gas rather than purchasing it off the co-op, which reduces the amount of total gas vented; also the company has plans to connect the gas gathering system to a sales line which would enable them to sell the excess.

"It's the gas gathering and gas conservation. That's the longer-term solution. The shorter term solution is gathering tank-top gases and flaring them," Proctor said.

But Alain Labrecque has put in an objection to the company's submitted plan, which would include installing a bunch of pipelines in order to connect to the sales line.

In their dealings with the Labrecques, Baytex offered Alain and Karla compensation as a relocation allowance, "to give us more time to correct the issues that they were concerned about," Proctor said.

But this included the stipulation that they would not object to future planned developments by the company in the area.

"We did ask them to be patient with us and make the corrections that we needed to make and therefore to give us time to do those things without them objecting to further things that we were trying to improve," Proctor said.

But that was a no-go for Karla and Alain, who said they believe signing such a letter would mean not having legal ground to stand on should further problems arise.

"That would mean we're legally binded (sic) to shut our mouth," Alain said.

Residents are encouraged to seek medical treatment and get medical testing for their ailments, says ERCB's Barter.

"We had a similar situation in Three Creeks where there is health concerns but there is no corroborating evidence showing that and that's where we can't move forward because the health concerns need to be addressed by Alberta Health," he said.

This frustrates original homesteader Andy Labrecque.

"It's like the onus is on us. You have to prove to us that this is making you sick. That's going to take a few years. Why can't we flip that around? You have to prove to us that you're not making us sick?"

erin.steele@sunmedia.ca