Walker County Commissioner Bebe Heiskell thought back Friday to her first days in office.
There she was, in January 2001, looking through the local government’s finances. She noticed the previous administration missed some payments. Then, she said, representatives from the city of LaFayette came in to talk about the county’s bills.
Turns out, Heiskell said, Walker County hadn’t paid LaFayette for utilities for the final three months under the previous commissioner, Buddy Chapman.
“They came in,” Heiskell recalled of the LaFayette employees, “and said, ‘We’re going to cut the power off. We’re going to cut the water off.'”
Heiskell said she scrambled to pay the late bill, another example of the financial mess she inherited from Chapman.