Town of Plains undergoes lawsuit

PLAINS – The town council met Monday night to discuss a variety of issues on the docket. After approving previous minutes and listening to the different reports, Mayor Brinson brought to the council’s attention that the town is being sued.

It was brought to the attention of City Attorney Rich Gebhardt last Friday afternoon that a place out on Helterline Lane had flooded.

“The people are suing the town and the county because our levies are too high on the lagoons and it causes water to go other places than down the river,” said Mayor Brinson.

Gebhardt sent the paperwork to the Montana Municipal Interlocal Authority and is waiting to hear back.

According to Mayor Brinson, the people who put the lawsuit in place are also blaming the county for dumping rock back into the levy, stating if the rocks would not have been dumped into the levy, the water would have continued to go down stream and would have not affected their place.

“I know very little about it but I want to make the town aware of it,” said Mayor Brinson.

The council also discussed an incident that occurred earlier last month concerning a dog attack. No names were disclosed during the conversation.

According to Police Chief of Plains, Shawn Emmett, a dog was picked up and quarantined for biting a community member. The dog was kenneled for the quarantine to ensure the dog did not have rabies. After plastering signs throughout town, no one came forth to claim the dog.

Shawn was to take the dog to the veterinarian to be euthanized but due to the vet’s busy schedule the dog was to remain in the kennel another day until the vet could come up and euthanize it.

The person in charge of the kennel called to see if they could personally deliver the dog to the vet. After approval from Emmett, the person attempted to take the dog into the vet, however, things did not go as planned.

Emmett received a phone call stating the person was in the ER after attempting to remove the dog from the kennel and being bit. According to Emmett, the dog opened the door to another kennel where another dog was being held and during the dogfight, bit the person attempting to remove the dog.

After Emmett went back up to the kennel to check on the dog per the owner’s request, he was able to coax the dog sponsible for the attack into his police vehicle and transport it to the veterinarian where it was euthanized.

Once the dog was dropped off, Emmett headed to the ER to check on the person who had been bit. After seeing the injuries, Emmett told the clerk to send the medical bill to the town.

Because of the concern of rabies, the person bit requested the dog to be tested for rabies. The dog had been quarantined for over ten days, the proper procedure for checking for rabies and the vet stated there was no need to do the test. However, the injured person insisted.

The town received the medical bills but kept receiving other bills as well.

“I thought it was the right thing to do and so it wasn’t a problem. We ended up getting the bill. Next thing you know, we’re getting all these other bills. We’re getting the bill for the rabies test, we’re getting all these drug store bills and bills for the vet bill for the other dog,” said Emmett.

Mayor Brinson addressed the issue sating there is no money in the budget to pay for situations like this. The $1,800 medical bill was to come out of the police budget because Emmett was the one who said the town would take care of it.

According to the Good Neighbor Policy, the town is not held accountable for what happened because they were trying to help.

The council was faced with the decision of deciding what to pay for.

After some debate, the town came to the agreement “to pay charges of the ER bill on 4/24/13 and supplies but not the dog rabies bill or her personal dog vet bill. As of 5/18/13, the town will not pick up any liability,” washing their hands of the problem and paying the lump sum of the expenses. According to reports, the victim will have to pay around $500 on her own, which accounts for the rabies test as well as veterinarian bills. The town did agree to pay all other medical bills up until May 18 when the last bill was submitted.

“I felt responsible in the fact that I agreed,” said Emmett discussing how he did allow the person to transport the dog when “in hindsight” he should have said no.

The council agreed to the terms unanimously.

Another issue covered at the town council was the pool.

The pool had opened for its first day on Monday and approximately five hours after the opening , the water began to turn cloudy.

Mayor Brinson stated it was not the chlorine and said the town will perform a backwash on the pool tomorrow and send samples off to the lab to see what results they will get. Mayor Brinson stated it could have possibly been paint chips.

The town council’s next meeting will take place at 7 p.m. on Monday, July 3.