The City of New London has released the costs associated with the collapse of the historic centuries-old church in New London in January.
The bills for the city total more than $244,000 for the response and cleanup of the property that's owned by Engaging Heaven Church. The city has now placed a lien on the site in an effort to recoup that money.
The mayor said the lien is to protect the city.
“It’s just a necessary step that we have to take," said Mayor Michael Passero. "It shouldn’t be interpreted as any kind of a hostile move or anything like that. We’re intending to work with [the church] to reimburse the taxpayers.”
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Costs include $150,067 to Manafort Brothers, Inc. for labor, equipment and materials used during the demolition of the property which spanned several days, $10,418 to Eagle Environmental, Inc. for air quality and asbestos testing, $28,076 to Total Fence LLC for installing the temporary fence that secured the site, and tens of thousands of dollars in police, fire, and city personnel costs.
“The last we heard, the church was intending to reimburse the city," Passero said. He said he wasn't aware of when they plan to pay the city back. He said the city's counsel is working with the church's counsel.
“We’ll be paying those invoices on time, it’s our obligation. We had a public emergency, we hired these companies, and they fulfilled their obligation to us, and we intend to fulfill our obligation to them," he added.
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Some of the bills are due as soon as next month. Passero said the city will dip into capital funds to pay them.
“We have to find buckets of money to re-appropriate for something like that. We don’t have a line item to cover something like this. So, we’ll probably look to existing capital accounts, capital projects accounts to move money, hopefully temporarily," the mayor explained. "It’ll hold us back a bit, but we’ll be able to afford to cover these costs."
As for the latest on the site, rubble is still piled high as there hasn't yet been a decision on remediation.
Engineers are still looking into a potential cause of the collapse.
Engaging Heaven Ministries did not respond to our request for comment.
