The City Council passed a resolution Monday evening accepting a settlement for West Orange in the British Petroleum lawsuit resulting from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. West Orange was awarded $182,180 from British Petroleum in the settlement. Mayor Roy McDonald said there will be attorney fees and other expenses subtracted from it, but McDonald added that the city had just received the settlement information and the city council had not had time to discuss how the money will be used, but it probably will be applied to items in West Orange damaged by the oil spill in 2010.
The City Council approved an ordinance mandated by the Environmental Protection Agency pertaining to storm water quality. Though the ordinance was passed Mayor McDonald admitted it will not be easy to enforce it. McDonald said cities are required to pass ordinance like this to prevent pollutants in surface water, and the mayor promised West Orange would do the best it could to enforce the ordinance to eliminate pollutants in the water of any kind.
West Orange will join other local cities suspending for an additional 90 days an application for a rate increase from Entergy Texas. A $200,000 contract for constructing a sanitary sewer system was awarded to T. Johnson Incorporated. The project is part of a Community Development Block Grant. Sanderson, Knox and Company was the lone bid received to conduct an audit for West Orange.
Landlords in West Orange are still not pleased with two recently passed ordinances by the City Council. Ordinance 230H dealing with landlords having to be responsible for garbage collection on their rental properties has received much criticism during council meetings. Ordinance 414 requires landlords register their rental property each year by paying a fee and having them inspected by the city. Robert Sepulvado thinks the ordinance is a violation of citizens’ rights against improper search and seizure. Sepulvado said the City Council was elected by the people of West Orange and should consider their rights. Sepulvado stated if the city does not address the problem he may consider using his money to correct the situation concluding that if the city passes an ordinance then they should enforce and he didn’t want to enforce it himself.
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