Alabama Power files suit against two landowners

By Scott Wright

CENTRE — The Post has learned that Alabama Power Company is continuing its efforts to enforce its property rights along the shores of Weiss Lake in Cherokee County.

Last month, the Birmingham-based company filed legal actions against two local landowners seeking injunctions to stop the construction of structures the company claims violate its flood easement.

In a pair of lawsuits filed separately against a landowner from Calhoun County and another from Bartow County, Ga. on Feb. 5, Alabama Power claims it notified both defendants as early as the summer of 2006 that unspecified construction projects on their lakefront lots were in violation of the company's permitting process.

According to one complaint, the defendant from Calhoun County was first informed in August 2006 that a “partially-completed structure” on her property was not in compliance with Alabama Power's permitting requirements. When agents from the company revisited her a month later, they discovered that construction was continuing.

After she was presented with a written notice outlining the specifics of the violation, the complaint stated that the property owner “threw the notice in the trash.”

A follow-up letter in February 2007 notifying the defendant of continuing non-compliance resulted in the property owner contacting Alabama Power on at least one occasion. But, the complaint states, “the defendant has since changed her phone number and Alabama Power can no longer get in touch with her.”

In its complaint against the Calhoun County landowner, Alabama Power is seeking to have the defendant enjoined from conducting further construction, claiming the company will “suffer irreparable harm” from being deprived of its “exclusive right to possess and enjoy its easement rights.”

A second lawsuit, filed the same day against a property owner from Kingston, Ga., seeks similar legal consideration for a structure begun without the proper permits.

In the second complaint, Alabama Power claims it notified the property owner on at least three occasions beginning in September 2006 that his construction project violated the company's easement rights. The complaint claims the defendant “failed to offer any response” to two follow-up letters.

Alabama Power spokeswoman Gina Warren told The Post her company does not comment on pending litigation.

The company opened a shoreline management control office in Centre in July 2006 in an attempt to better police construction of illegal structures inside its flood easement along the 447-mile shoreline of Weiss Lake. The flood easement consists of around 17,500 acres.

Tommy Miller, who runs the shoreline management office, told The Post a year ago that he was confident the first cases that make it into the courtroom would be decided in the company's favor. He said he believes any defendant whose only legal defense is “but this is what my neighbor did” won't be able to prevail, legally.

“I can understand why people might think we're being selective in our enforcement,” Miller said in January 2007. “But I can assure anyone who feels that way that we will eventually enforce these rules fairly and equally on anyone who has built something that Alabama Power's shoreline guidelines say they can't.”

The names of the individual landowners were withheld at the request of Cherokee County Circuit Clerk Dwayne Amos. He said they still have not been formally served with the lawsuits.

"We've had some trouble getting in touch with them," he said.