Norris City Council takes over interim role as Water Commission
The Norris City Council meets in special session on Tuesday, May 2, to appoint itself as the acting Norris Water Commission. From left are: Councilwoman Loretta Painter; Councilmen Chuck Nicholson, Will Grinder and Bill Grieve; Mayor Chris Mitchell; and City Manager Adam Ledford. (photo:G Chambers Williams III )
The commission oversees the city’s water and sewer utilities.
The move on Tuesday (May 2) came in the wake of the resignations of four of the five Water Commission members in April, the last of whom was Margueritte Wilson.
Wilson resigned from the commission in an email to City Manager Adam Ledford on Friday, April 28, four days after two others had submitted their resignations.
Commission Chairman Richard Dyer and Vice-Chair Sue Hill sent their resignations by email to Mayor Chris Mitchell on the previous Monday.
A fourth member of the five-member commission, Alex North, resigned from the board in early April for personal reasons. He was not involved in the controversy that apparently led to Dyer, Hill and Wilson quitting.
Wilson’s resignation left only one member still on the commission: city Councilwoman Loretta Painter, who represented the City Council.
Mayor Chris Mitchell called a special meeting of the City Council for May 2 to deal with the lack of a quorum on the Water Commission, and City Manager Adam Ledford advised the council that the only move available immediately was for the council itself to become the Water Commission, at least until a new slate of commissioners could be appointed by the mayor and approved by the council.
“You do not have a board now that is functional,” Ledford told the council during the special meeting. “You only have one option – for you to become the acting board.”
“I 100 percent support doing this since we don’t have a Water Commission,” Councilman Will Grinder said.
The council approved the change unanimously.
But the council also voted to remove from the special meeting’s agenda a proposed ordinance that would make the move to have the council serve as the Water Commission board permanent.
At least three of the five City Council members said they would prefer to appoint a new board later.
“I support the structure and how it’s set up now, and not have the [Water Commission] members be the City Council,” Grinder said. “I think we should build [the Water Commission] back.
“But I think [the City Council] needs to have more oversight [of the Water Commission] than in the past,” he added.
Councilmen Chuck Nicholson and Will Grieve agreed with Grinder about keeping the separate Water Commission board.
“I am not ready yet to abolish the Water Commission,” Nicholson said.
Grieve added: “I agree 100 percent with Chuck and Will.”
Because the Water Commission must appoint its own chair and vice-chair during an actual Water Commission meeting, the council agreed to wait until the next regular meeting of the Water Commission, which was set for 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 15.
Mitchell said the two main candidates for the chair and vice-chair positions will be Nicholson and Grinder.
The last three Water Commission resignations came in the wake of Painter’s move during the April 19 commission meeting to call for Dyer to resign.
Painter’s request was in response to a profane slur Dyer made against Norris resident Joe Feeman during the March 28 Water Commission meeting, which many observes viewed as part of a longstanding feud the three commissioners had fostered with the Watershed Board during their terms on the commission.
Feeman is a retired TVA forester who serves as volunteer forestry consultant to the Norris Municipal Watershed Board. He also is chairman of the Norris Planning Commission.
Dyer, who has held several elected and appointed positions in Norris government including mayor and councilman, said publicly of Feeman during the March meeting: “This man is a bastard.”
The comment came during an expletive-laced tirade Dyer made accusing Feeman and the Watershed Board of not cooperating with the Water Commission in oversight of the spring in the watershed that supplies drinking water to city residents.
The watershed is a 2,300-acre wooded area deeded to the city by the Tennessee Valley Authority, and is open to the public for multiple uses. It is bordered by Norris Dam State Park, TVA, and private property, and is adjacent to the city of Norris.