The squabbles between the Mahaska County Board of Supervisors and the County’s Emergency Management Agency continue.  At Monday’s Mahaska County Board meeting, Board Chairman Mark Groenendyk said a lawsuit filed by the EMA against the County Supervisors and Auditor Sue Brown had been dismissed by a judge.  Then Groenendyk said the EMA, at its meeting on Thursday, decided to file a new lawsuit against the County Board.   Groenendyk says going to court is expensive.

“I think the Board of Supervisors have spent in excess of half a million dollars defending the County from their lawsuits. They’re also expecting us to fund their lawyer and I’ve not added up those expenses.  So it’s kind of interesting. Everybody that votes to keep suing is not willing to put forth a dime of their own levies and funds, but wants the county taxpayers, as a whole, to keep funding both sides to fight against each other.”

Mahaska County EMA Director Jamey Robinson tells the No Coast Network money for their attorneys is coming from the EMA’s budget.  Robinson goes on to say the new lawsuit is because the County isn’t honoring the EMA budget for the current fiscal year.  Groenendyk agrees Mahaska County must have an EMA to protect its citizens.  But something drastic could happen if the lawsuits continue.

“We are required to defend the citizens of our county.  And we talked about that, department heads know about it and we heard from them today.  We’ll have to cut services; we’ll have to cut personnel.  Services will be cut if we have to keep defending our county.”