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David Nicholas: Opening statements were heard today in the trial between 2,000 mid-Michigan property owners and the state. Attorneys claim the 2020 collapse of the Edenville Dam and the subsequent flood is the state's responsibility. I spoke with WCMU reporter A.J. Jones to break down all sides of the case. What can you tell me about what this case is about?
AJ Jones: The Edenville Dam failed in 2020, which contributed to a massive flood, which caused around $175 million in damages. The owners of the dam, Boyce Hydro, went bust, but their bankruptcy claim was denied. So, now the residents have been focused on suing the state and holding them liable for the failures of the dam. The case against the state has been bouncing around, stuck in limbo and appeals, as the state has tried and failed to get the case resolved without a trial. A lot of the residents in this area say they're still recovering financially from all the damages caused by widespread flooding, which the failure of the Edenville Dam contributed to.
DN: What was the gist of the opening argument for the property owners?
AJ: Sure, so Thomas Juan was one of the lawyers that gave an opening statement, and he represents a lot of the property owners. Juan said that the dam failed key tests and had structural issues. However, the Four Lakes Task Force, which is a private group representing property owners in the area and the state, both wanted the levels of Wixom Lake which is adjacent to this dam, they wanted the levels to be raised. Now the states, according to what Juan said, wanted these levels raised because they wanted to protect mussels. And they had sued Boyce and threatened more legal action against them in order to get the levels raised. This is what he said on the floor of the court today.
Thomas Juan: The mussel litigation damages allegedly were up in the $300 million range when they did some type of analysis of it. But they were huge. And this was a huge threat to basically whipsaw Boyce into raising the water levels.
AJ: They allowed the levels to raise. The state of Michigan gave them, Boyce, the permit to raise them knowing the spillways were inadequate. They ignored, they being the state, ignored state law that according to one, requires a dam to be shut down or addressed sufficiently in some way. And not only did they not shut the dam down, but they also, like I said, concealed its issues, according to their case.
DN: A lot of allegations in that opening statement. How then did the state respond?
AJ: Okay, so the state's lawyer, Nathan Gamble, provided points to directly respond to all of the allegations. Federal regulators who had been regulating and keeping an eye on this dam up until very shortly before the incident had kept the levels the same, as when the flood occurred, and those federal regulators found that the dam was in good condition multiple times. There was no indication from federal officials, no indication from the state officials or other engineers that have been looking into this, that the lakes needed to be drawn down. The second, and this is the most important point, Gamble said, is that the state fundamentally does not control the dams. The responsibility for the dams and Wixom Lake relies on Boyce, right? Boyce does not report to the DNR. The DNR does not tell Boyce Hydro what to do. The DNR had sent several orders to Boyce regarding the lake levels that had been ignored. This, according to Gamble, is the responsibility of Boyce.
Nathan Gamble: Private property operated by private people who did not take direction from state employees. It just did not happen.
AJ: In a nutshell, the state's argument, is it's not their responsibility. The reason this happened is because of Boyce Hydro and the various allegations of the state knowing about the dam being structurally unsound are really relevant to whether or not this was the jurisdiction of the state.
DN: What is next? And do we have an idea how long this trial might run?
AJ: Yeah, so evidence is currently being heard. We're going to hear from various state environmental officials and experts in this sort of thing over the next two or perhaps three weeks. This is pretty significant just because this trial has been five years in the making and because potentially if the property owners win, the state is going to be on the hook for potentially quite a bit of money. And if the state wins, well, Ben Johnson, their law firm (for the property owners) have argued that this is a massive dereliction of duty by the state and it could potentially open up new avenues where the state could avoid responsibilities.
DN: My conversation with WCMU reporter AJ Jones from earlier today.
![The Cheboygan River Dam's sea lamprey trap can hold up to a thousand lamprey. When sea lamprey are returning to the river to spawn in the spring, the trap needs to be emptied multiple times a day. The blue crane [on the far left] by the dam is used to lift the trap out of the water.](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/941e9c9/2147483647/strip/true/crop/3474x1936+0+249/resize/560x312!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F39%2F3c%2F81307d274e889e4b036955cbea28%2Fimg-1299.jpg)
