Utility, hospital board to see changes

Published 12:06 am Tuesday, January 8, 2013

NATCHEZ — The Adams County Board of Supervisors Monday decided to replace the whole of the St. Catherine Creek Utility Authority and three members of the Natchez Regional Medical Center’s board of trustees whose terms were expiring.

The St. Catherine Creek Utility Authority was created in 2007 to maintain and accept liability for certain properties connected with the former International Paper industrial site when the county was brokering the sale of the property to Rentech. The alternative fuels company, which has since shelved its plans for its Adams County project, did not want to buy the landfill or wastewater site associated with the IP property.

The authority is funded by a $5,000 monthly payment by Rentech. At one time, a plan existed to open the landfill and fund the authority’s operations — which consist of monitoring the wastewater site and landfill — through the funds generated by its operations.

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Recently, however, most of the authority’s board members have resigned, and before that, meetings were very often poorly attended. Supervisor David Carter said in 2011 only one person — Woody Allen, who has since resigned — attended half of the meetings.

As of Monday, only two of the five board members remained, Stephen Guido and Peter Rinaldi, and the supervisors were even unsure if Guido had already resigned his position on the board or had expressed a desire to be replaced.

The utility authority’s board is structured so that its members have no term limits and serve only at the will of the board of supervisors, Supervisors President Darryl Grennell said, and the supervisors voted to remove the remaining members and replace them with fresh faces.

The new St. Catherine board will be Akash Dania, Scott Christian, Chandler Russ, Virginia Salmon and Ledine Washington.

The three members on the NRMC board of trustees who were replaced were Gwen Ball, Nelson Baughmann and James Walker. Their terms are set to expire Feb. 4.

Taking their place will be Linda Godley, Lee Martin and Lionel Stepter.

A fourth member of the NRMC board, John Serafin, was reappointed.

The supervisors also approved adopting resolutions thanking Ball, Baughmann and Walker for their service.