WFHB Bloomington Community Radio
The opening of Hard Truth Hills in Nashville is the latest development in an ongoing water dispute. The town of Nashville and Brown County Water Utilities are currently in legal proceedings over who gets to supply water to the distillery.
Because of the size of the company and the amount of beer and spirits they distill, Big Woods is the largest water consumer in Nashville, using more than 30% of the town’s water supply. That’s led to a lawsuit after the town of Nashville annexed the land for Hard Truth Hills, last year.
The annexation of Big Woods’ firecracker hill property inspired Brown County Water Utilities to file a lawsuit against the Nashville Town Council, last June. The annexation of Firecracker hill into the town of Nashville allegedly encroaches on Brown County Water Utilities service area.
Brown County Water Utilities is a private company that provides water to areas of Brown County, including Nashville Utilities. Nearly all of the water that the town of Nashville sells to customers comes from Brown County Water Utilities.
The company’s service area formerly included firecracker hill, before it was annexed by Nashville. Following the annexation, Nashville signed an agreement with Big Woods to provide water to the then newly-proposed brewery site, Hard Truth Hills, as well as all other Big Woods sites in Nashville.
Brown County Water Utilities claims the agreement between Big Woods and Nashville is invalid, due to the fact that the company is still paying off federal loans. The company cited a 1961 federal act saying that service can’t be limited within a company’s legal service boundaries, including firecracker hill.
The town of Nashville says that it needs the revenue it receives from supplying all of the water to the Big Woods Company sites.
BCWU has expressed concern, though, that if Nashville is able to supply water to Hard Truth Hills directly, one day they could decide to take their business elsewhere, which would harm BCWU.
Last July, BCWU spent $95,000 on a new pipe system that would allow them to supply Hard Truth Hills, but Nashville Water Utilities had already connected to the site at that point. It would cost Big Woods an extra $100,000 to connect to the BCWU pipe, a price that Big Woods does not seem inclined to pay.
As of right now, negotiations between the two parties over who will supply water to the site in the long run have come to a standstill. The parties will spend the rest of the year preparing for a legal decision, sometime in January.
