No new developments have been announced since the City of Teague began their research into a twenty-eight year old Interlocal Definitive Agreement between Teague, the City of Fairfield and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s (TDCJ) Boyd Unit.

Drafted in 1990, the original Agreement was proposed by the City of Teague to provide water and wastewater services to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s (TDCJ) Boyd Unit, located between Fairfield and Teague on Highway 84.

According to Teague’s City Administrator Secretary Theresa Prasil, all available information has been submitted to Monte Akers of Akers & Akers Law Firm for an outside evaluation of the Agreement as directed by Teague’s City Council on Monday, April 16th.

Prasil told the Freestone County Times that the City’s requests for twenty-eight years of records from the City of Fairfield are promised to be fulfilled by no later than May 25th.

Fairfield’s City Administrator Jeff Looney has explained that due to outdated record keeping practices and updates in software, extra time is needed to retrieve records dating back to the Agreement’s inception in 1990.

Questions first arose when the Cities’ attorney Linda Sjogren of Bojorquez Law Firm, who represents both Teague and Fairfield in the Interlocal Agreement, contacted Prasil on April 13th with a request to address the Council regarding Teague’s official release from the current Agreement, as well as the new proposed bond being pursued by the City of Fairfield and TDCJ [to be referred to as the TDCJ Expansion and Water System Improvements Project].

Looney explained that taking this step would simply mean that Teague would not have to be involved in any new negotiations involving the existing Agreement, or be involved in the proposed TDCJ Expansion and Water System Improvements Project.

“What was verbally agreed to in the past with Mayor [Earnest] Pack was that Teague did not want to be a part of the Boyd Unit in the future and wanted to be clear of all responsibilities,” explained Looney.

With the current Interlocal Agreement still in place, Teague is being asked to release themselves from the Agreement in light of the new proposed bond for the TDCJ Expansion and Water System Improvements Project being discussed by Fairfield and TDCJ.

“TDCJ can take back the facilities [upon completion of the bond in 2020], but they have asked that we [the City of Fairfield] continue to operate the systems out there because the City of Fairfield has been doing that since the start.”

Fairfield City Council will hold its regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday, May 8th at 6 p.m. Teague’s Board of Aldermen will meet in regular session on Monday, May 21st at 6 p.m.

Editor’s Note:  This article was written prior to the May 1, 2018 termination of Fairfield’s City Administrator.