FEMA pullout doesn't change suit

As the Federal Emergency Management Agency prepares to have the first of some 13,000-plus mobile homes and travel trailers stored at the Hope Municipal Airport moved off the site, a local resident who has sued both the City of Hope and FEMA over rainwater runoff from the site has revised his federal lawsuit to include the contractor who did the site work to allow FEMA to house as many as 18,000 units at the airport.

Taking a cue from a pleading by FEMA that it was not responsible for the work which its contractor did, plaintiff Ronald Buck, of Hope, filed an amended petition in U.S. District Court in February to include the contractor, Clearbrook LLC, of Mobile, Ala., in the lawsuit with FEMA and the City.

In seeking leave to amend Buck's original complaint, his attorneys noted that the lawsuit has yet to reach the “discovery” stage at which evidence would be shared by both sides, and no hearings have been scheduled to argue motions before the court.

“Because Plaintiff did not know Clearbrook LLC may be responsible for damages pled until the pending motion to dismiss was filed, he could not reasonably have included Clearbrook LLC as a defendant (in) his Original Complaint and First Amended Complaint,” the Feb. 16 filing states.

Arguing FEMA's overriding responsibility regarding its lease with the City, Buck's pleading notes that, “FEMA graded or caused to be graded the south end of the Airport Property in order to store thousands of mobile homes and travel trailers in 2005. FEMA graded a substantial portion of the Airport Property by adding SB-2 crushed rock and Geotech fabric. The City leased the Airport Property to FEMA and approved the grading.

“Clearbrook LLC contracted with FEMa to perform the grading at the Airport Property. At FEMA's direction, Clearbrook LLC added SB-2 crushed rock and Geotech fabric to the grading.”

Buck has consistently contended that the addition of the crushed rock and fabric created a drainage problem because rainwater runoff could not evaporate or percolate into the soil, and the bulk of the runoff was consequently channeled by the changes onto Buck's property, damaging access roads to his poultry houses and creating a flooding hazard to his property from enhanced overflow of a small creek running through his property.

FEMA's lease of several parcels of acreage at the airport expired Feb. 28, but has now been extended through the end of the year to allow contractors for the buyers of some 15,000 of the units stored there to begin removing the units.

Columbus, Ohio-based Greenlawn Companies Vice President Brian Younkin told the Hope City Board of Directors last week that his company and a consortium of partners were the buyers for the bulk sale which FEMA and the General Services Administration had conducted. That sale had drawn the ire of U.S. Representative Mike Ross, D-Ar., who wanted FEMA to restrict the sale to smaller lots and allow individuals to bid, thereby reducing what Ross saw as a risk to the manufactured housing market in Arkansas.

But, Younkin and his partners knew nothing of the expired FEMA lease, and told the City Board that they were surprised to learn they would have virtually no time in which to remove the units.

Hope City Attorney Joe Short said Tuesday that any change to the status of the mobile home units would not change what is at issue.

“I don't think it will have an effect on it anyway; because, he is complaining of the grading and the other things that he says changed the drainage,” Short said. He said the removal of the units is not a matter that has been discussed.

Short said that, under FEMA's lease with the City, the agency has the responsibility for reclamation of the property to restore it to its original condition after it surrenders leased parcels.