PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO READ THIS POST AND COMMENT BELOW. YOUR VOICE IS INVALUABLE. (We are especially interested in comments from those with construction experience).
Vestavia Storm water update: We had the opportunity to attend a Work Session of the Vestavia Hills City Council last Monday to listen to discussion about ongoing stormwater issues within the city, and specifically a couple of construction sites we have been following. We appreciate the city allowing us an opportunity to be heard. It was an informative discussion and since our integrity was called into question, we wanted to provide our takeaways: 1. We appreciate the coverage by Emily Featherston of this important issue in the Vestavia Voice. You can read the recap of this meeting here:
Vestavia Voice.
While we put our name on every post, every complaint, and routinely meet with responsible parties, not everyone wishes to be identified on social media, so we have redacted this quote to avoid any public embarrassment: “xxxxxx xxxxxx and xxxxx xxxxxxx were at the meeting representing the firm, along with David Butler of Cahaba Riverkeeper, who made the complaint — and authored the social media post in question. xxxxxx and Butler went back and forth about whether the site was in compliance, and Curry ultimately requested that Butler file an item on the city’s Action Center or email the council with specific complaints, and said that as the city’s resources allow, they would continue to monitor issues as they arise.” Our social media posts to inform the public of this issue have been repeatedly characterized as “contentious.” con·ten·tious (kənˈten(t)SHəs/) - adjective: contentious causing or likely to cause an argument; controversial. "a contentious issue" synonyms: controversial, disputable, debatable, disputed, open to debate, or vexed.
Of course, we dispute that there is any dispute, which was confirmed on Friday, when ADEM released this proposed consent order, which had been signed by the developer 10 days earlier. Curiously, the pending consent order was not mentioned on Monday and was not available to us until the following Friday. We are struggling to understand how, when some of the issues raised in the consent order had not been addressed as of February 25th, the department was willing to negotiate a settlement based on a complaint from October and discount the original penalty by $3600. We are pleased, however, that we were able to help return another $10,000 to the state’s general fund. 2. There are currently 179 active land disturbance permits in the city. An estimated 10-12 were issued in January and the city does not have the manpower to monitor compliance. A new employee will start at the end of the month to help in this area. We sympathize with the scarcity of resources because we are a non-profit with one paid employee, reliant on your generosity to fund our programs.
Contrary to public perception, we do not receive money from the state or the sale of “Save the Cahaba” license plates. We are eternally grateful for our army of volunteers who make our work possible, and fines recovered as a result of our activities are returned to the state. We believe the city is sincere in their desire to protect the environment, and as stakeholders, we are committed to helping them overcome this issue. We have asked to inspect/copy the list of 179 active permits so that we can organize concerned citizens to monitor these sites. You can donate to this effort HERE or you can assist us monitoring those sites by contacting us by e-mail, text message, social media, or a traditional phone call. 3. There seems to be a flaw in the system by which ADEM delivers permit documents proactively to the city, information critical to the city’s ability to monitor active sites. This gap is evidenced by the fact that the city was unaware of the pending consent order. We have asked ADEM to clarify how this process works, in the hope that we can help get the city the information it needs to make sound decisions. 4. And finally, over the last week we have been in the process of reviewing our social media policies, as it was asserted that we had ignored repeated attempts to contact us through Facebook with an invitation to visit the site and discuss these issues.
We have established a track record of meeting with anyone, both proactively and in response to a request, in an effort to facilitate productive discussions. It was acknowledged that we had also contacted the developer prior to filing a complaint with the state and that attempt was ignored. In any case, we were horrified by the allegation that we did not respond. After combing through every post and every message, we have been unable to locate the messages in question. We have asked for screenshots of those messages, which we have not yet received, so that we can track down our alleged failure to respond. As part of that review, we also evaluated how we inform the public of issues affecting YOUR Cahaba River, and concluded that our policy will remain unchanged.
Our Mission
The mission of the Cahaba Riverkeeper is to defend the ecological integrity of the Cahaba, its tributaries and watershed and to ensure clean water, a healthy aquatic environment, and the recreational and aesthetic values of the river. The Cahaba watershed is monitored to identify violations of clean water legislation. If notification to the violator and appropriate authorities fails to produce action, remedial and legal action is pursued to protect this unique natural resource and drinking water supply.
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Lee J
Cahaba Riverkeeper Board Member
Birmingham, Alabama
@thealliance