It has been a quiet week for litigation in the civil lawsuit over control of Cullman County’s water supply since a circuit judge’s order forced one side in the conflict — The South Cumberland Cooperative District (SCCD) board — to stand aside so that county employees and managers could continue to operate the system.

A flurry of legal filings earlier this month had attended the newly-comprised Cullman County Commission’s assertion to manage the water department its way, suspending longtime manager David Bussman without pay and launching an investigation into how the department’s revenues had been administered.

The suspension, along with the commission’s effort to extract itself as a party defendant in all litigation in which it had previously been embroiled, sent lawyers representing the SCCD and its oversight board — the Governmental Utility Services Corporation of Cullman County (GUSC) — into defense mode. The two boards are defendants in three separate lawsuits, all of which have been filed by some combination of county residents and current or former county political aspirants seeking the overturning of the creation of the two boards, and the entrusting of the county water department, its employees, revenues and contractual rights to their oversight.

All of the legal maneuvering comes just ahead of court-ordered mediation negotiations set to begin in early December. That process will engage both sides in the suit with a third party in order to find common ground in the hope of reaching a settlement.

In the most notable suit, filed May 7 shortly after the former commission lineup created the boards, a change in the legal defense team was quickly followed by a filing before Circuit Judge Don Hardeman asking the court to direct a local bank, where the SCCD may have held some of its revenues, to remit that money to Cullman County.

The commission also asked the circuit court not to recognize the defendants’ surety bond — called a supersedeas bond — submitted by the SCCD that, if recognized by the circuit clerk, would allow the SCCD to continue with its appeal of a circuit court injunction before the Supreme Court of Alabama.

Citing the county commission’s present will not to be involved as a party defendant in the case, the request notes that the high court has established a precedent that calls for each party requesting a supersedeas bond to individually stand for the bond. That, the commission argues, is not possible since only the SCCD — and neither the GUSC nor the county — has taken steps to post the bond.

For its part, the SCCD requested the Supreme Court to allow the board to submit its bond outside the 10-day timeline originally set for its posting, effective Sept. 29. While the bond was submitted to circuit clerk Robert Bates’ office for acceptance well outside that timeframe, attorneys for the SCCD argue that a number of extenuating circumstances — including a circuit court-issued restraining order — made it impossible for the SCCD to act within that 10-day window.

In any case, they further argue, the 10 days was not intended to be interpreted as a hard deadline for a bond to have been posted; rather, it was a statement by the high court that no further action in the case would be taken for 10 days “to allow appellants [the SCCD] time to secure said bond.”

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