Attorney general seeks damages for Table Rock Lake pollution from developers of stalled project

December 07, 2010|by KY3 News | newsalerts@ky3.com

GALENA, Mo. -- Attorney General Chris Koster sued two developers for polluting Table Rock Lake in Stone County. The lawsuit charges the defendants with violations of Missouri's Clean Water Law. A federal grand jury also indicted the developers for the pollution last summer.

Koster said James Shirato, owner of Indian Ridge Resort, and Donald Snider, managing member of North Shore Investments, planned a $1.6 billion, 850-acre development near Branson West less than a mile upstream of Table Rock Lake. The development, known as Indian Ridge Resort, was to include hundreds of homes, condominiums, an eight-story hotel, water park, golf course, conference center, and retail shopping and restaurants.

The groundbreaking for the project was in 2005. Koster said no work has taken place at the site since August 2008 when the developers' bank failed and was taken over by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Since then, with each rainfall, sediment is washing from the cleared areas into erosion channels and then into Table Rock Lake.

"Every developer in our state is aware of the obligation to ensure the environmental integrity of their development sites," Koster said. "This office will aggressively pursue any developers who show disregard for our environmental laws."

Koster is asking the court to issue an order requiring the defendants to comply with the Clean Water Law; to assess a civil penalty not to exceed $10,000 per day for each violation of the Clean Water Law; to pay for their damage to Table Rock Lake, and to require the defendants to pay all costs associated with the case.

A federal grand jury handed up a three-count indictment in July against Indian Ridge Resort, Shirato, North Shore Investments, Snider, and David Drake, another owner of North Shore Investments. The indictment accuses the defendants of violating the Clean Water Law by allowing soil runoff into the lake; it also says Shirato lied to an investigator when he said he was prohibited by the FDIC from entering the property, so he couldn't do anything about the pollution.

Shirato, Snider and Drake could face fines of $500,000 if they're convicted in federal court. Their trial is scheduled to begin next March 11 in U.S. District Court in Springfield.

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