Ashland — The city of Louisa has been hit with a bill of nearly $481,000 for legal fees and expenses from a 9-year-old federal lawsuit filed by two environmental organizations.

U.S. District Judge Amul R. Thapar ruled last week the American Canoe Association and the Sierra Club, which sued the city, its water plant and its water and sewer commission about violations of the federal Clean Water Act, were entitled to receive $418,720 in attorney fees and $62,165 in expenses.

That amount was substantially less than what the association had sought — $1.2 million in fees and $263,000 in expenses, according to court records.

Louisa City Attorney Eldred E. “Bud” Adams Jr. filed a motion last week to stay the award pending the outcome of the city’s appeal of an earlier ruling in the case, stating in effect that having to shell out the entire amount at one time would bankrupt the city.

Louisa, Adams wrote, is “a small, poor community of 2,000 people,” and immediate enforcement of the judgment “would obviously disrupt the vital functions of the city.”

The lawsuit has a long and convoluted history. American Canoe filed it in March 2001 after notifying Louisa that discharges from its water treatment plant into the Big Sandy River were violating the Clean Water Act.

The next month, the state Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Cabinet took administrative action against the city. Negotiations between state and city officials produced a settlement in August 2001.

Under the terms of the settlement, Louisa agreed to renovate its water treatment to comply with its pollution discharge permit by March 2003, and also agreed to pay a $3,000 civil penalty.

American Canoe wasn’t involved with the negotiations, although Louisa kept the organization updated throughout the discussions.

Louisa’s new water plant went into service in October 2003 and the city received official notice from the state that it complied with the settlement six months later.

American Canoe’s lawsuit was dismissed in June 2002 for lack of standing. However, the organization, which was represented by the Washington, D.C., environmental law firm of Terris, Pravlik & Millian, appealed the decision to the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, which reinstated the case in November 2004.

In February of last year, Louisa won partial summary judgment and Thapar dismissed American Canoe’s claims for civil penalties for alleged post-2001 permit violations. However, American Canoe also won partial summary judgment, for proven pre-2001 violations, and, in July, Thapar ordered Louisa to pay $30,000 in civil penalties.

Adams appealed that decision to the Sixth Circuit the following month.

The city initially disputed whether American Canoe was entitled to receive attorney fees at all, and also challenged the number of hours worked by the organization’s attorney, their hourly rate and their expense calculation.

Among other findings, Thapar determined that American Canoe was entitled to collected attorney fees because it had “substantially prevailed” in the lawsuit because the action “sparked a chain of events that changed Louisa’s behavior.

“American Canoe reached the goal of its litigation — to force Louisa to comply with the Clean Water Act regulations,” Thapar wrote.

The judge also ruled that American Canoe should collect less than what it sought in part because the fees should be based on the rates charged by Kentucky attorneys, rather than Washington lawyers.

KENNETH HART can be reached at khart@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2654.