A recent meeting between Eudora city officials and Douglas County Rural Water District No. 4 board failed to produce an agreement.

But it did show just how far apart the two sides are in a dispute that has spurred a federal lawsuit.

City officials made a presentation to board members last week in an effort to settle a lawsuit RWD No. 4 filed in September in U.S. District Court, Kansas City, Kan. The lawsuit seeks to prevent the city from providing service to properties annexed into the city in recent years south of Kansas Highway 10 along Douglas County Road 1061. The land includes Lawrence Memorial Hospital’s future Eudora health care campus.

City officials offered approximately $235,000 to pay off the water district’s federal loan to settle the suit. The water district said the offer was too low.

“We were disappointed that they didn’t seem to be interested in the offer we made,” City Administrator Cheryl Beatty said.

RWD No. 4 officials say the district would make upwards of $6 million by serving present and future customers within the roughly 153 acres in the Fairfield district during a 40-year period.

“We made an offer of long-term service,” RWD No. 4 District Administrator Doug Schultz said. “We’re saying if we released the service, that’s our calculation of what we’d be losing over a 40-year period of time.”

In November 2003, after RWD No. 4 enlarged the district, it and the city agreed the district would negotiate with Eudora a “fair market price for compensation to be paid to RWD No. 4 for meters and/or other infrastructure that is reusable by the city when upon annexation.”

The definition of “fair market price” is the sticking point now.

“They seem to have drawn their line in the sand and we can’t seem to break the grains open to allow us to pass through, and that’s unfortunate,” Beatty said.

However, Schultz said RWD No. 4 would like an amicable resolution to the lawsuit.

“We want to resolve the issue in a way that is very cooperative and recognizes that the city of Eudora is growing,” he said. “We are really looking for a mutually beneficial agreement and harmony with city.”