Bad Links?
Other glitches?
Notify Webmaster

Time for Tyrone to stop ducking mud

By DENNIS CHASE

The sediment issue in Tyrone continues to be rather muddy mess. A number of meetings have taken place over the last few weeks to try to determine what, if anything, in the way of help can be provided to those folks who live in the Lake Pendleton subdivision on the eastern edge of Tyrone.

The problem, in case you have missed it, is that a whole lot of sand and silt has filled a large portion of the homeowners association lake and they have asked the mayor and Town Council for help.

The most recent public meeting took place Thursday, Oct. 14. It was a public meeting in the context of the public was “allowed” to listen but comments or questions were not allowed.

Clearly the mayor and council did not want anyone to interfere with the smooth workings of government.

The intent of this gathering, evidently, was to find which guilty party among the developers and outside (of the city limits) organization was at fault and determine who was willing to pay for dredging Lake Pendleton.

Not once, by anyone, was the issue raised of Tyrone’s responsibilities for the problem faced by the Lake Pendleton Homeowners Association. Not once!

It is my opinion, and I have a great deal of on-site experience here, that the majority of the sediment in Lake Pendleton came from the Handley Park Ball field development.

This project took place four years ago with the land clearing and filling for those ball fields being a project of the town of Tyrone.

On Jan. 18, 2001, I read a statement at a regular council meeting where I said that in addition to filling wetlands, the town was also in violation of the state Sediment and Erosion Control Act.

This statement was made after I had tried to work with town staff to correct the problems with very little response.

Likewise, the council failed to act or even react and the sediment continued to flow into Lake Pendleton.

Of course, the proper action when a serious violation of the Georgia Sediment and Erosion Control Act occurs is to issue a stop-work order and when that fails, a court citation.

Tyrone is one of many cities that have the legal responsibility to enforce this law, but they would be in the somewhat awkward position of stopping their own project and issuing an order to themselves to appear in magistrate’s court to answer the judge as to why they failed to follow the law and their town’s comprehensive plan. Confusing, isn’t it?

So now the town is busy looking at a few local developers and at work outside the town with the obvious intent of placing the blame for the problem in the lake.

But we have essentially the same problem with the town again. If the developers were doing such a bad job with sediment control so they are now blamed for the sediment in the lake, and the town of Tyrone has the legal responsibility of enforcing the Georgia law, why weren’t there a whole series of stop-work orders and citations against those developers?

Once again Tyrone officials have failed in their responsibilities and one more time they are pointing their collective fingers at everyone but themselves.

But back to the Thursday meeting. The Pendleton Homeowners Association has hired an attorney who attended the meeting with them. The homeowners feel violated and don’t believe they should have to pay for what someone else did to their lake.

What to do? Well, their legal options are limited because they can’t file suit against the town for failure to enforce the sediment and erosion control law. But there may be grounds for a suit against the town for the large percentage of the sediment from the ball fields.

Unfortunately, it will be their association dollars to implement the suit, the town will use their tax money to defend against the suit and their tax dollars would be used to dredge the lake if the homeowners win the case.

Under those circumstances, it might seem more appropriate to go after the developers, but they have already hired consultants who found it wasn’t the developers’ dirt that filled the lake.

It appears that a lawsuit against that group is almost doomed to failure from the start. Not a happy set of circumstances for our neighbors around Lake Pendleton.

The best, and cheapest, answer to this muddy mess is for Tyrone to find a way to pay for the dredging and not force the homeowners to take the more expensive legal route.

It is my opinion that both sides, perhaps three or four sides, would pay for lawyers as well as associated legal costs and the town will be found at fault and have to pay for it anyway.

This option would be expensive for everyone and it is my opinion that all of the developers and the homeowners would have a valid claim against the town for their legal costs of bringing the suit, paying for all those consultants and in the case of the developers the cost of defending themselves.

I repeat, fix the problem you caused, Tyrone, and save your town taxpayers a huge cost!

The mayor and council know they caused the problem. It is clearly time, perhaps past time, for them to stop trying to place the blame elsewhere and do the right thing.