Porter Circuit Court Judge Rebecca Buitendorp heard arguments Thursday on whether to change how the Valparaiso Lakes Area Conservancy District is governed.
At issue is whether to change the board of directors from seven members elected by district to three at-large members.
Stu Summers, who filed the lawsuit to change the representation for VLACD property owners, testified that the way the seven districts are drawn results in an uneven number of freeholders, with 267 in one district and just 79 in another.
General Manager Alicia Barber, however, testified that the districts, drawn in 1993, are grouped with subdivisions not split between districts and that the districts have distinct issues with drainage and other concerns.
The conservancy district provides drinking water and sanitary sewers under contract with Valparaiso City Utilities, as well as stormwater management.
Summers, who ran for the VLACD board last year and lost, and eight others distributed petitions to the VLACD members seeking to force both a change in the board representation and possibly buying directly from Valparaiso City Utilities rather than the conservancy district buying those services and reselling them.
VLACD raised its rates twice last year, Summers said.
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Summers’ group of nine VLACD members dropped the push to force negotiations with the city on that petition when he discovered the board can do that on its own without the court in effect revising the VLACD charter to do so, Summers testified.
Buitendorp’s challenge is to determine whether the petitions represent 20% or more of the VLACD freeholders, one of the thresholds for the court to consider changing the charter, or whether conditions have changed enough to allow a change.
Summers testified that defining the number of freeholders first required defining what a freeholder is. If a person or corporation owns multiple properties, they get only one vote, not one for each parcel. And if a parcel is jointly owned, such as by two spouses, they get only one vote, not one for each person.
Summers believes the petitions have enough valid signatures to represent roughly a quarter of the VLACD freeholders. Barber and the VLACD leadership, however, believe it’s less than 20%.
Both sides in the debate have until June 11 to file their final arguments in the case before Buitendorp issues her ruling.
If she sides with Summers, the case then goes to the Indiana Department of Natural Resources for its review. Attorney Scott McClure, representing Summers, expects the DNR to have no problem with changing the board from districts to at-large, since it’s a governance issue and doesn’t affect any infrastructure.
Doug Ross is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.