Federal regulators have imposed a $15 million fine against the former owner of a mid-Michigan dam that unleashed a 500-year flood last year, saying that the company failed to perform important safety work after the disaster, MLive.com reported. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) announced on April 15, that it would assess the penalty against Boyce Hydro, a bankrupt company co-owned by Lee Mueller of Nevada that formerly operated the Edenville Dam. The Gladwin County dam failed last May, causing a downstream failure of the Sanford Dam and subsequent flooding in the village of Sanford, city of Midland and beyond. The fine has been anticipated since FERC proposed it in December. It equals the largest civil penalty for a hydroelectric dam safety failure in the United States, assessed after the 2005 Taum Sauk reservoir collapse in Missouri, which also resulted in a $15 million fine. The fine is based largely on Boyce Hydro’s failure to act on federal orders after the May 19, 2020 dam collapse in Edenville, which caused more than $200 million in estimated damages and forced the temporary evacuation of about 10,000 people. However, attorneys say it’s unlikely the fine can be paid because Boyce Hydro is insolvent and bankruptcy claims by creditors such as Byline Bank and other flood victims are taking priority over payment to the federal government. Boyce Hydro no longer owns the dam, which was transferred to the Four Lakes Task Force (FLTF). The task force paid $1.5 million to acquire the Edenville, Sanford, Secord and Smallwood dams through eminent domain as a delegate of Midland and Gladwin counties.
