Shawnee sues to recoup nearly $5 million in losses

By Ann Weaver

Published: March 23, 2006

SHAWNEE - The city of Shawnee has filed a lawsuit in an attempt to recoup as much as $5 million spent on failed improvements to its water treatment plant.

The lawsuit filed this week in Pottawatomie County District Court is against Holloway, Updike and Bellen Inc. of Muskogee, the firm that designed Shawnee's new water treatment system; Ozone Technologies Inc., the Tyler, Texas, company that manufactured the equipment; and Garver Engineers of Little Rock, Ark., the consultant hired to oversee a water pilot study for the project.

City Manager Jim Collard said the lawsuit was filed after months of negotiating with the defendants in a good faith effort to solve the problems at the water treatment plant.

He said the negative pressure ozonization system recommended by the firms doesn't meet the water treatment standards as promised. Collard said the system was installed in early 2004, but the city has not been able to use it. Water has continued to be treated with the old chlorination process, he said.

The lawsuit alleges the three companies conspired to sell the city the negative pressure ozonization equipment, knowing the ozonization process might not work.

Along with collusion, insider dealing, fraud, negligence and civil conspiracy, the firms are accused of breaching their contract with the city.

City Attorney John Canavan said city officials want all of the money they put into the new treatment system returned.

According to city records, about $2.7 million was spent on the negative pressure ozonization system and about $2.7 was spent expanding the plant's daily treatment capacity from 6 million to 9 million gallons.

Canavan said for the city's investment, its taxpayers got neither.

The effort to update the old plant began in 1999, when the city was notified by the state Department of Environmental Quality that its water contained high levels of trihalomethanes -- a waste byproduct contained in almost all water supplies.

Collard said the water is safe to drink, but the water quality agency is requiring the city incorporate a treatment process to reduce its amount of trihalomethanes.