County revisits Allenbrook

Multiple votes to amend were considered, but the only one to pass determined the county would withhold payment until next month to discuss Silver Oaks and Warriors Chase, two communities in similar situations that worked on roads without assistance.

County Commissioners Van Shaver and Adam Waller motioned and seconded, respectively, with the vote passing 6-2. Opposing votes were from Commissioners David Meers and Matthew Tinker.

Eight of the 10 county commissioners were present last week, with Harold Duff and Julia Hurley absent.

Tony Aikens, Lenoir City mayor, told commissioners the city took in the roads and two bids were opened Feb. 19, with the lowest being $120,300 from APAC Atlantic Inc. The other vote from Greenback Asphalt Company Inc., was $134,525.

Aikens previously provided an estimate by road superintendent J.J. Cox and councilman Eddie Simpson of about $110,000. Aikens said he would not ask for additional money.

“If this stays true, we’re going to have a lot of these,” Van Shaver, county commissioner, said. “If the county’s going to have to pay for half the city’s, the city should pay for half the county’s and vice versa. If we’re going to hold to this thing that (Russ) Newman was a shared employee then everybody needs to be treated equally.”

Local officials for weeks have discussed former planner Russ Newman’s involvement in Allenbrook and a letter of credit residents say was never obtained.

Shaver has said Newman was not a county employee at the time and instead represented a Loudon County Executive Planning Council, similar to that of the Loudon County Economic Development Agency.

Bill Satterfield, county commissioner, worried about the ramifications of moving forward with payment. He asked Warriors Chase representative Andy Armbrust what would happen if the county continued with payment for Allenbrook.

“Look, I’m not going to threaten you. I’ve already done the calculation — $37,770,” Armbrust said of the cost for roadwork. “If we hire a lawyer, they can run that bill up in discovery. We’ll spend more trying to collect the money than we’ll get. So that’s the math. You do the right thing. If you’re going to do it, do the right thing for the rest of us.”

Shaver motioned to rescind the previous commitment made with a second by Waller. That vote failed 5-3, with six votes necessary for a majority. Opposing votes were by Meers, Tinker and Satterfield, who took a long pause before voting against Shaver’s proposal.

“If people were not supervised correctly, things were not followed under the guidelines that they were supposed to be and people were left to not do their job and it was the county’s responsibility or the group partnership they were in, then we should be (responsible),” Tinker said.

With the first vote failing, Shaver came back with a motion to amend to pay the $55,000 if the city agreed to pay half of reimbursement for Warriors Chase and Silver Oaks. Waller seconded the amendment. The vote also failed 5-3, with opposing votes from Meers, Tinker and Satterfield.

Shaver said after the meeting that Silver Oaks paid $7,125.15. Warriors Chase paid $37,770. “That’s not amending a motion, that’s having a new motion,” Tinker said.

“We pay the half if they pay our half,” Shaver added. “I mean how can you argue against it? Newman worked for both of us, right? He was a shared employee.”

Shaver emphasized commission was here to amend the motion, which is what he was trying to do.

Tinker questioned bringing the matter to the workshop for further discussion.

Commission can consider multiple amendments, Waller said.

“I’ve done exactly what commission instructed,” Aikens said. “We took the roads in last Monday night. We had a bid opening this morning. I agree with this gentleman over here and Commissioner Tinker. The county needs to step up to the plate here and do the right thing for all these people.”

Commissioners initially considered a motion to adjourn, but it failed. Shaver then made a motion to withhold payment for Allenbrook until after next month to discuss Silver Oaks and Warriors Chase, which ultimately passed.

Shaver believes a precedent is set with payment for Allenbrook.

“Even though I voted for this last amendment, I don’t know that it does a whole lot,” Satterfield said. “Like I said, they’re still going to get their money. This delays payment.”

Satterfield said the county put itself in a position to honor the first vote.

“I think there will still be additional discussion about Allenbrook,” Shaver said in a follow-up interview. “... When I heard a couple of people say it needs to go the workshop was when I was bringing up the part, OK, if Lenoir City wants us to pay half of theirs and we’re using a shared employee then Lenoir City should pay half of ours since it’s that same shared employee.”

Representatives from Warriors Chase, Allenbrook and Silver Oaks were present.

Armbrust said Warriors Chase in 2014 went through a yearlong effort to get its roads paved, at the time starting with former county mayor Estelle Herron and later with current mayor Rollen “Buddy” Bradshaw.

“While everybody was extremely sympathetic to our plight, which basically boiled down to Russ Newman signed off and released the bond that the builder placed on our subdivision would have guaranteed financial assurance that our roads would have been fixed,” Armbrust said. “So everybody was sympathetic.”

The community footed the bill for Patty Construction to pave the roads before they were taken into the county system in December 2015, he said.

“But the upshot of that is the residents of that time — 40 homeowners in Warriors Chase — essentially paid an extra close to $1,000 each to get their streets paved,” Armbrust said. “And while I applaud this subdivision for their efforts and everything, I’m a little baffled. First of all, it’s my understanding this subdivision is kind of like out of the jurisdiction of Loudon County’s, it’s in Lenoir City itself and everything. So we’re a subdivision that fell square in the jurisdiction. We tried to play the game the right way, we tried to do everything the right way and we were sent packing and now there’s somebody else.”

Barrett Hobbs, Allenbrook Homeowners Association board member, was also present.

“I have been researching this thing for five years,” Hobbs said. “I sympathize with this man over here from Warriors, because it was the fault of Russ Newman for letting all of these letters of credit expire. Now whether or not you (Van Shaver) say he was a county employee or not, there’s plenty of documentation that says he’s a county employee because he’s received W-2s.”

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