Birmingham City Council President Johnathan Austin (City of Birmingham) Erin Edgemon | [email protected]

The Birmingham City Council plans to hire a law firm to represent the body in a lawsuit seeking to void two state laws that beginning next year that would dilute the city’s control of the Water Works Board.

President Johnathan Austin said the council is against the expansion of the Water Works Board and wants to hire its own lawyers to represent them in the lawsuit filed by the Water Works Board.

The members of the City Council are named as defendants in the lawsuit despite a majority of them supporting the Water Works Board’s position.

“The council believes that it is in the best interest of the citizens of Birmingham (for the city) to retain control of those assets of the Water Works,” Austin said.

The council on Tuesday passed a resolution, which they claim, gives Austin the power to sign the contract to retain the law firm of Bainbridge, Mims, Rogers & Smith LLC to provide legal services for up to three years at a cost not to exceed $25,000.

During the council meeting, Assistant City Attorney Tracy Roberts said the resolution hadn’t been reviewed by the legal department. He questioned the legality of the document.

Austin said the resolution was passed because Mayor William Bell has refused to sign the contract allowing the City Council to hire their own lawyers.

He said the city’s law department is representing Bell in the lawsuit and not the interests of the Council.

A representative from the mayor’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

City documents submitted into the court record show the City Council first passed a resolution seeking to hire lawyers on Aug. 9. Bell later vetoed the resolution, records show.

Austin said the Council overrode the mayor’s veto, but the mayor still refused to sign the contract.

“Once the veto was overridden, the mayor has a duty under the Mayor Council Act to do whatever the Council has instructed him to do relative to that contract, which was to sign it and engage the law firm,” he said.

The Water Works Board of the City of Birmingham filed a lawsuit in June against the city of Birmingham, Mayor Bell, the Birmingham City Council, the Jefferson County Mayors’ Association and the Shelby County and Blount County commissions.

The board asked for a judge to void the 2015 and 2016 legislative acts that will add members to the Water Works Board from outside the city and put new restrictions on the board. The suit also seeks preliminary and permanent injunctions against the defendants from taking any actions, including expansion of the board, under those acts.

Under the new laws, the board will be expanded from five to nine members. Four of the members would be appointed by the Birmingham City Council, two by the Birmingham mayor, one by the Jefferson County Mayors Association and one each appointed from the Blount and Shelby County commissions.

Both Bell and the City Council filed separate motions in response to the Water Works suit claiming to represent the city of Birmingham in the action.

In response, Circuit Court Judge Robert Vance filed on order on Sept. 15 dismissing the case against the City Council and city of Birmingham. He said the mayor and members of the council had to be named in the suit as individuals.

“To avoid any political squabbling, the court also dismisses the City of Birmingham without prejudice,” the order states. “The ‘City of Birmingham’ appears unnecessary in any event given that the mayor and (presumably) the members of the City Council will be participating herein in their official capacity.”

The Water Works lawsuit was later amended to omit the city of Birmingham and the Birmingham City Council and to name the mayor and the members of the council individually as defendants.

Austin said City Council members have until Nov. 4 to respond to the lawsuit.