Lexington town officials feel they won their battle with a river polluter.
A Lexington County jury set the price the town will pay – $7.25 million – for the former Carolina Water Company treatment plant that leaked raw sewage into the Saluda River.
Town officials wanted to pay up to $5.4 million for the plant but had argued for a $2.02 million verdict.
Carolina Water, renamed Blue Granite, wanted the town to pay $12.8 million.
MacDougall said the town now owns the plant property, will close the lagoon and is building a pump station.
The Blue Granite sewer customers the town has been servicing since February 2018 pay the town $2.1 million a year, Mayor Steve MacDougall said.
Dave Wilson of McAlister Communications, representing Blue Granite, said the town raised rates 20% for 2,200 Oak Grove sewer customers. That produces about $3 million a year, he said.
Wilson said Blue Granite will seek $2 million in attorneys’ fees, expert fees and related trial preparation fees for the 2-week trial.
“We appreciate the jury’s service and we are glad to have this matter resolved,” MacDougall said.
“The sole role of the jury was to determine the value of the system and their verdict was closer to the town’s appraised value than it was to Carolina Water’s.
“As mandated by DHEC, the Town of Lexington accepted our responsibility to take over the facility in 2018 and spent millions of dollars making the necessary upgrades so the system meets standards.
“Within the first 28 days of the Town of Lexington taking over the treatment plant we closed the valve that leaked poorly treated, nearly raw sewage that was being discharged into the river for decades. It will never enter that body of water again – ever.”