MOCKSVILLE ó The former public works director pleaded guilty in federal court last week to charges that he ordered employees to falsify reports on the quality of the town’s drinking water, had them dump extra chemicals into the town’s wastewater plant in order to get kickbacks and used town equipment and state inmates for his side business.
Daniel L. Smith, who became the public works director in 1994, pleaded guilty Thursday in U.S. District Court in Greenville, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District. Smith resigned in December.
Nicholas Slogick, who oversaw operations at the town’s water- and sewage-treatment plants, pleaded guilty Wednesday in Green-ville, the news release said. Slogick was fired in July.
State environmental officials say that there was no threat to the town’s water at any time.
The charges were the result of a yearlong investigation by the criminal division of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the State Bureau of Investigation, the Winston-Salem Journal reported. The town has to submit data to the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources about the turbidity of the town’s water in order to meet federal environmental regulations.
Tom Boyd, senior environmental specialist in the public-water section of the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources, told the Journal that turbidity refers to the amount of cloudiness in water. If the water is too cloudy, that may obscure disease-causing bacteria, he said.
Smith was charged with instructing employees to send false data that understated the turbidity of the town’s drinking water. The Journal reported that he also conspired to violate the Clean Water Act by getting town employees to “pour massive amounts of degreaser and caustic, a corrosive chemical,” into the town’s sewer system, according to federal prosecutors.
Smith received kickbacks because he would dump the chemicals and then get the town to buy more.
The extra chemicals caused problems in the wastewater-treatment process and resulted in a town violation of state environmental requirements, Boyd said.
Smith also is accused of using town equipment and employees for his personal business, Danny Smith Enterprises, Ivan Vikin, the acting special agent in charge of the EPA’s Criminal Investigation Division in Atlanta, told the Journal. The company provided maintenance and repair services to other towns and residents. Smith is also accused of using state inmates assigned to town projects to work for his company. According to federal prosecutors, he never asked permission or reimbursed the town.
Smith knows what he did was wrong, said his attorney, Walter C. Holton Jr., but Smith’s intent in sending false data was to protect the town from a fine by state and federal environmental agencies.
“His motivation was not to enrich himself,” Holton told the Journal. “It was to protect the town of Mocksville from getting a several hundred thousand-dollar fine from the EPA.”
Town officials knew about Smith’s personal business, Holton said. Town Manager Christine Sanders told the Journal that the town did know about the company but never gave Smith permission to use town equipment or employees for his company.
Kickbacks came in the form of what Holton called gift checks. He said Smith received $4,000 to $5,000 over several years.
As for the chemicals, Smith was just trying to dump them in the best place environmentally that he could think of, he said.
“He shouldn’t have done that,” Holton said. “It’s better than dumping it in the wetlands or in the lakes. He dumped it into the system that would be purified and cleaned up. It’s not like a big oil spill into the Yadkin River.””
Slogick, who pleaded guilty to knowingly submitting false data to the state, released this statement to the Journal: “I submitted a letter to the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources Water Supply Division on May 7, 2007, where I humbly took responsibility for the data that was submitted under my signature and do not know why the EPA pursued it further and singled me out.”
Slogick is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 2. Holton said that Smith would be sentenced in either February or March.
Sanders said that all employees are expected to follow rules.
“When someone chooses to betray the public trust, they have to be held accountable,” she said.