Sulphur Springs Mayor Resigns

SULPHUR SPRINGS -- Mayor Quinton Hoffer resigned at a special meeting Tuesday evening after City Council members called for him to step down last week.

"I feel that I have served this community to the best of my ability and that my heart was right," Hoffer said, reading from a prepared statement. He noted the city's accomplishments during his three-year term, including a new library and new grants for the city.

He left City Hall after receiving a round of applause from the roughly 20-person audience, shaking hands on his way out the door.

The council appointed Alderman Bobby Simon to fill the rest of Hoffer's term, which ends in 2010.

The council did not fill Simon's position.

Simon said he wants the city to follow all of its ordinances more closely.

He said one of his top priorities will be to "clean up the city" by dealing with vicious dogs and abandoned cars. Hoffer has been at odds with the council since the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality proposed a consent administrative order that listed several problems at the city's wastewater treatment plant.

The order, which would be a voluntary agreement between the city and the environmental department, cited violations of effluent limits, lack of backup power and improper testing techniques, among other problems.

The wastewater treatment plant has been operating without a permit since Jan. 31. Discharging without a permit is a violation of the federal Clean Water Act, and is punishable by fines of up to $10,000 per day.

Hoffer said at a Feb. 6 meeting that the city had hired James Boston, a wastewater treatment operator for Decatur, to help with the plant and to fill out the permit application. Boston said Monday that he was not hired to fill out the permit, although he thought he was going to help city staff with the process.

"I guess we all kind of lost track of it," he said.

Alderwoman Martha Kreder said in an interview before the meeting that Hoffer did not keep the City Council informed about what's happening in the city.

Her biggest problem with Hoffer was the expired permit, she said.

"That is gross incompetence," she said.

Mo Shafii, assistant chief of the environmental plant, said last week that several of the plant's problems had been fixed.

The city is working on a list to tell the environmental department what problems it has fixed and how it plans to fix remaining problems.

Shafii said last week that he did not know what the penalty would be for the expired permit.