Sikeston utilities board files civil suit in contract negotiations

SIKESTON, Mo. -- For decades the Sikeston Board of Municipal Utilities has dumped the treated wastewater from the city's power plant into a nearby drainage ditch under the control of the Richland Drainage District. Since the city's industrial park was finished more than 10 years ago, wastewater from the facilities there have gone into the ditch, too, all under contract.

But unless a deadlock in contract negotiations is overcome before the end of the month, the Sikeston facilities will have to find another way to get rid of their wastewater. Sikeston is asking the Scott County Circuit Court to intervene.

The Sikeston Board of Municipal Utilities, or SBMU, filed a civil suit June 7 asking the court to find a remedy in the conflict with the drainage district.

James Robison, Sikeston lawyer and SBMU attorney, said he hopes a resolution to the situation between Sikeston and the drainage district can be reached before June 30, when the contract between the two entities expires, without the assistance of a court that probably wouldn't review the matter before then.

SBMU has been trying to change the terms of the agreement for three years, Robison said.

"I don't know what's going to happen, but if Richland stands its ground it's going to have a serious impact," Robison said. He said without the use of the district ditches wastewater from Sikeston facilities will have nowhere to go, possibly causing those facilities to stop operations, including a Good Humor-Breyers ice cream plant that employs about 800 people.

At the crux of SBMU's suit is a renewal contract for wastewater dumping the drainage district submitted to SBMU in November. SBMU was seeking to add to the 400,000 gallons per day the current contract allows at the industrial park, but Richland has declined to increase the number, saying its ditches are filled to capacity during wet weather.

SBMU wants to increase the daily discharge to 1 million gallons per day to provide for growth, Robison said. It does not yet need that much capacity on a daily basis, he said, but added the Good Humor-Breyers plant on some days can discharge that amount.

Under the contract, SBMU pays $1,500 to the district per year for each of two outlets, one at the power plant and one at the industrial park. There is no limit on power plant water output.

"At this point we are full, our ditches are overflowing," said Cape Girardeau lawyer John Heisserer, attorney for the drainage district. The district maintains ditches for draining farmland in parts of Scott and New Madrid counties. "Our board's purpose is to protect farmland, not industry," Heisserer said. "That's where the problem lies."

Farmers in the district boundaries pay taxes for the district's services. When ditches overflow their fields are flooded. Heisserer said flooding happens mostly during wet spring weather, causing delays for farmers planting their crops.

In arguing for more discharge capacity Sikeston cites expansion of its industrial park, including a proposed 123.9-million-gallon-per-year ethanol plant to be built by Bootheel Agri-Energy LLC.

In the suit, Robison says the drainage district refused to extend the SBMU contract until Richland was through negotiating an outlet permit with the ethanol plant. Robison he's now not sure if the ethanol plant negotiations have effected SBMU's contract renewal, but he is sure the district has "written a letter to us saying we should cease all discharge by June 30."

Heisserer said negotiations with the ethanol plant aren't impacting the SBMU contract renewal. But board members are concerned about the ramifications when the plant does start operations, still months or years away.

Sikeston lawyer Jim Hux, attorney for Bootheel Agri-Energy, said the plant's discharge hasn't been resolved with the drainage district and the company is looking at alternatives for getting rid of wastewater.

"We feel like we're at capacity at the present time," Heisserer said. "But this is a separate and distinct agreement from the SBMU permit."

Heisserer said he's confident that a temporary agreement can be reached that would allow SBMU to continue use of the ditches until a compromise can be hammered out, or that SBMU can sign the renewal contract. There are other options as well, Heisserer said, "some of which involve some expense."

Waters Engineering in Sikeston has studied the ditches and concluded they haven't reached capacity, said Robison, determining the extra capacity SBMU seeks "would have almost no impact".

Heisserer said any engineer could make that determination by looking at the ditches during low-water periods, such as the past few weeks.

msanders@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 182