Lawrence Mayor Urges Judge To Reject Columbia Gas Settlement

LAWRENCE, MA — Lawrence Mayor Dan Rivera asked a judge Wednesday to reject a proposed $143 million class action settlement with Columbia Gas over last year's gas explosions. Rivera told the judge that too much of the money would go to the class action lawyers, rather than victims of the deadly accident. The attorneys would get $23.5 million of the total, Rivera said.

Rivera calculated that if the attorneys worked every day since the disaster, that $23.5 million would amount to $44,351.50 per day, whereas the median household income in Lawrence is $39,627.

In a statement, Rivera also criticized the need for residents to apply for settlement funds, which they have until Jan. 9 to do. Under the proposed settlement, all residents, property-owners and business-owners of Andover, Lawrence and North Andover on Sept. 13, 2018, the date of the deadly gas explosions, are eligible for cash payments. Class members can also apply for itemized compensation for specific extraordinary losses.

"Columbia gas has a list of every affected victim and all of them deserve fair compensation for their loss, not just those who can navigate these bureaucratic settlement processes," he wrote. "Asking 4,000 affected residents to go through yet another claims process for this funding when just last year they went through a chaotic, invasive and demeaning process that left them frustrated and not fully compensated for their loss with Columbia Gas is a completely unnecessary hurdle."

National Transportation Safety Board found in its report on the explosions that "weak engineering management" led to them. The accident skilled one, injured 22 and damaged 131 structures, as well as taking gas service offline and forcing the evacuation of hundreds of homes.

Mayor @danrivera01843 Objects to Class Action Settlement- Atty’s to make $40K per day. “At it’s core, this settlement favors interests of the class action attys and not the victims in the three communities that were and continue to be directly impacted.” #MVGasfires pic.twitter.com/tWTelEnbrB
— Kate Reilly (@kate2pointoh) December 11, 2019

Christopher Huffaker can be reached at 412-265-8353 or chris.huffaker@patch.com.