With the Governmental Utility Services Corporation of Cullman County (GUSC) having lasted nearly a year — almost all of it embattled in litigation — the board’s fate, along with that of the hamstrung water utility over which it has nominal authority, is far from certain. But one thing is becoming clear, according to the board’s most active spokesman: ongoing mediation isn’t going to solve anything.

GUSC member Dennis Haynes, who also serves on the South Cumberland Cooperative District (SCCD), said Friday the opposing party in mediation talks ordered by the state Supreme Court has dragged its feet in making good on the concessions it had allegedly offered at the talks’ outset last month.

“The purpose of mediation is to settle — and that was my intention when I left our talks on December the 6th,” said Haynes Friday. “But mediation is not going to succeed. The Supreme Court will have to say ‘thumbs up’ or ‘thumbs down.’”

Why? Haynes said it’s because the parties opposing the GUSC in mediation — several local residents and county commission chairman James Graves, who sued the water boards after their surprise creation at a commission meeting last April — had promised to comply with one key request Haynes said he felt would benefit the public: mutually requesting that the City of Cullman open its accounting records to demonstrate how it has historically charged Cullman County and other water customers for water it sells at wholesale cost under the terms of its existing water purchase agreement.

Read the complete story in the Sunday, Jan. 23, 2011 print edition of The Cullman Times.

 

* Benjamin Bullard can be reached by e-mail at bbullard@cullmantimes.com or by telephone at 734-2131 ext. 270.