DHEC summons sewer authority to Columbia meet

Multiple overflows in the last six months are something that a state regulatory agency wants to talk about with Oconee’s Joint Regional Sewer Authority. South Carolina DHEC is summoning JRSA representatives for a March 19 conference at their Columbia offices, and a JRSA committee today decided to prepare for that conference by engaging the services of an environmental lawyer. The JRSA executive committee gave the executive director Chris Eleazer the authority to work out an agreement with Tommy Lavender Jr. of the law firm Nexsen Pruett. Eleazer says DHEC is concerned about four of six spills. Because of heavy rains that have produced flooding, JRSA officials regard the spills as acts of God. Committee members regard the expertise of an attorney, such as Lavender, invaluable when it comes to the potential for financial penalties which, if levied, could be negotiated down by an experienced attorney.