City Sues Company Involved With Power Plant

By Gordon HopkinsThe City of Fairbury has filed a lawsuit against a company that contracted with the city to remove equipment from the now defunct Fairbury municipal power plant but left town without fully paying.The court filing is dated September 29, 2023.When asked if he wished to make a statement, Fairbury Mayor Spencer Brown responded, “Not at this point.”In 2022, the City of Fairbury contracted with Industrial Engineering Solutions (IES), LLC, owner James Daniels, to purchase turbines, generators and other large machines from the power plant for $120,000.To date only a $12,000 down payment has been received.As of press time, the city has had no response from IES for payment requests. Attorneys for the City of Fairbury sent a demand letter on January 10 and a second letter on January 23, 2023.Both of those letters were sent to the address in California that was on the original contract.However, a online address search reveals that address to be a beauty parlor. IES is registered in Texas, per the Texas Secretary of State.The contract also included decommission an oil storage tank.According to the court filing, that was not done, “The City has incurred $6,000.00 in additional damages to decommission the oil storage tank as a direct and proximate result of IES’ failure to perform under the Contract.”Among the allegations in the court filings are: “Failing to decommission the oil storage tank by leaving oil in the tank, leaving the tank uncovered and posing an environmental hazard, “Disturbing asbestos during IES’ initial work on the storage tank, and leaving asbestos in an unremediated state; “Failing to pay the City the remaining $108,000.00 balance due for the equipment it had removed; “Leaving the city power plant site in a state of disturbance, requiring the city to expend resources to rectify the same.”Although not in the contract, Daniels did agree in an email to the city remediate the asbestos in the building.This is a civil action only. No criminal complaint has been filed by the city at this time.

Mary Blackburn

Football Action

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