By Richard Gaines
Staff writer
March 28, 2008 06:38 am A judge yesterday denied the town of Essex the right to withhold paying Gloucester $26,213.78 — the disputed portion of a quarterly sewer bill that has helped propel the municipalities into a legal tussle that could go on for many months. Town Administrator Brendhan Zubricki brought a check for the full quarterly charge of $78,621.60 to the office of Gloucester Public Works Director Joseph Parisi in the afternoon, after the ruling by Judge Maureen Hogan was posted on Essex Superior Court Web site. Zubricki's delivery got the town's payment in on time. Quarterly bills were due yesterday. Closing out the first skirmish in the town's challenge to the city's decision to charge Essex as it does all its sewer customers, the judge found that Essex had not "demonstrated a likelihood of success on the merits" of its case, or shown that paying the bill now while fighting on would risk "irreparable harm." Neither Zubricki nor members of the Board of Selectmen could be reached for comment last night. Mayor Carolyn Kirk, who considered a negotiated settlement with the town before deciding the case outlined by Essex counsel Kopelman & Paige was weak, also could not be reached. But Council President Bruce Tobey, who negotiated and signed the intermunicipal agreement when he was mayor in 2000, said he was "delighted" by the judge's refusal to grant Essex the injunction. He invited the town to "sit down" with city officials and discuss their differences. He had characterized the suit as a "family feud" by two financially-strapped municipalities brought on by unfunded federal mandates to the city and town for environmental improvements. Tobey also noted that the council approved the sewer rate last June by only a 5-4 vote and indicated the likelihood exists for reconsideration of the billing formula this year. Essex was protesting charges for the seven-year, $40-million combined sewer overflow project to eliminate periodic discharges of untreated sewage into Gloucester Harbor from pipes that carry storm runoff and wastewater. The city had decided to charge the entire combined sewer overflow project to ratepayers, though there was strong minority sentiment for splitting the burden with taxpayers. The town of 3,267 residents in 2005 began sending sewage through a new line it financed to the George P. Riley Jr. Sewage Treatment Plant on Essex Avenue. Under an intermunicipal agreement that was negotiated and signed in 2000, Essex was to be treated like other users, but sections of the agreement also seemed to bar the city from adding to the town's bill for capital improvements to the system on the island, apart from the Essex line. The rates of both town and city were pushed to near national-record highs by the cost of the combined sewer overflow project. Essex's first complaint about the city's interpretation of the agreement was rejected by then-Mayor John Bell last December. Kirk took office with an open mind, invited Zubricki to informal talks, and distanced herself from Lowe as the mayor sought a second opinion on the intermunicipal agreement and the strength of the city's case. She found herself in a complicated position, however, because Kopelman & Paige, the firm that she wanted to replace as the outsourced replacement for Lowe, was already representing Essex. After a private firm reviewed the case Essex might bring, Kirk told Zubricki the city would fight and expressed disappointment that Kopelman & Paige had given the town "bad advice." According to a scheduling memo with the complaint filed by the firm for Essex, the case, even if put on a fast track, could go on for two years. Kirk said she was advised that legal costs could exceed $100,000. That is about the amount that Kopelman & Paige alleged has been illegally charged — and paid — under the intermunicipal agreement. The city and town are already girding for another spike in sewer fees when the city undertakes a $30 million to $40 million retrofitting of the plant to allow for secondary treatment. Soon after Kirk took office, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency advised her that the order to add secondary (biological) treatment would be coming soon. Richard Gaines can be reached at rgaines@gloucestertimes.com
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