DUANE SHERRILLEditor

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen has approved the $744,000 payment of the cleanup bill for the fuel spill at Tullahoma Airport.

The decision was made following debate during a special meeting Thursday and during Monday night’s BoMA meeting to float the payment from the current city reserves. That money will be transferred to the airport for payment of Ozone Environmental Services (EOS) which did the cleanup. Meanwhile, the city will take out a loan to reimburse its reserves depleted by the payment meaning OES will get immediate payment and the city will replenish its reserves later with the loan.

“It’s a near certainty that if we don’t do that tonight, we are going to miss their deadline,” said Mayor Lynn Sebourn concerning potential legal action from EOS should the city not pay them by the Feb. 20 deadline.

“I don’t favor postponing,” agreed Alderman Matthew Bird. “I believe it puts us at further legal risk from OES and hurting our relationship with Ascend whose headquarters is in Tullahoma (Ascend had property neighboring the airport that suffered damage from the fuel spill).

Alderman Kurt Glick urged postponing the vote over funding the OES payment, saying there could be other avenues of funding that could come available if the board was patient and waited until the deadline. His motion to postpone the vote for funding failed 4-3.

The board of mayor and alderman ultimately voted 5-2 (Kurt Glick and Jerry Mathis dissenting) for the city to use interest bearing municipal bond airport outlay notes to pay the bill. The board then voted unanimously to use reserve funds to immediately pay the OES.

The spill was caused by an unlocked fuel pump that’s valve was activated by accident and left to spew fuel on the ground at the airport. A LifeFlight crew noticed the spill and alerted authorities; however, by that time a massive amount of fuel had spilled, much of it making it off the tarmac and into the soil.

During a special called study session meeting Thursday, the background of the spill was revealed with experts saying things could have been much worse had there not been quick action once the spill was discovered.

“In this case time was of the essence,” said Wade Evans, Coffee County EMA Deputy Director. “If we had waited and it had made it into that creek and into that water way it would have been a lot larger.”

Matthew Church of Ozone Environmental Service, which did containment and cleanup of the spill, noted that quick work on containment kept much of the spill on the pavement and prevented it from seeping into the ground. His company is locally based and he noted that quick response likely kept the disaster from being many times great. They arrived at the scene 19 minutes after the spill was reported.

“It could have been twice as bad,” Church revealed, noting that trying to chase down the spill at night was tough. “You could smell it everywhere. It was definitely a major fuel release that made it to the retention area.”

Church added that containing the spill was a race against time as they put crews into the storm drains with self-contained breathing apparatus. “We had to put people into the drains,” he said, noting the teams had to wade through the liquid underground at 2 a.m. with only headlamps as to not set off a flash explosion. “You have people’s lives on the line.”

 Church said by the morning after the leak, they were able to track the spill to the retention pond. “We were able to control the volume and stop it,” he said of the fuel leak, noting the stopping of the spill was important to the environment. “We would have a major aquatic life kill and this spill would have been a couple of million dollars. We’d still be out there.”

Church said there was consideration about cost effectiveness during the project as the city was able to provide services that helped reduce the overall costs.

“We completed the project and fulfilled our obligation,” Church said of the cleanup, noting had other companies come in and bid on the project it would have been a seven-digit bill. “For someone who doesn’t look at it every day, our bill is expensive. Not have coverage for it is a hardship. But I challenge this administration to call who you want. You aren’t going to find a company in this state who would have done this job for that price.”

He went on to say that the $744,000 bill owed for the cleanup by his service is an amount way below what anyone else could have done it for. He added that they didn’t bill the city for things like beatification rock that was placed on the airport’s neighboring land that was impacted and damaged as result of the spill.

“We have empathy for the city. We understand what you are going through,” he said. “I don’t want our generosity or our patience to come across as a weakness. If this wasn’t the city of Tullahoma and you owed me $744,000 and we were at this stage, you wouldn’t be dealing with me anymore.”

City attorney Brittany Hoskins advised the board concerning legalities as to how the bill can be paid.

“If the airport doesn’t pay this, the city is going to be liable because we own the airport,” she said. “I think the owner of this company has been pretty gracious with us.”

City Finance Director Sue Wilson revealed the city’s reserves are $7.5 million if they want to consider using reserves to pay the bill, although the high six figure bill would put a dent on those reserves. The other options include a hybrid using reserves and a loan or just putting it to debt on a loan.