NATCHEZ — The Concordia Parish Police Jury hopes a letter to a drilling company that the police jury believes damaged a parish road will keep the matter out of court.

The jury voted at its Monday meeting to send a letter to D&D Drilling stating if the oil drilling company did not repair the estimated $79,000 in damage to Deadening Road, the police jury planned to file a lawsuit.

Jury President Melvin Ferrington said the company damaged the road during recent drilling operations. The company did not obtain a road bond, Ferrington said, as required by the parish.

Ferrington expressed exasperation with the situation and said the jury needed to hold D&D Drilling accountable for the damage.

“We can’t allow people to come in and tear up a road and expect the taxpayers to pay for it,” he said. “Since it has gone as far as it’s gone, I say we let them bear the whole brunt of the costs or let’s go to court and see who’s going to pay for it.”

Ferrington said the police jury would need to obtain permission from the district attorney’s office then the attorney general’s office before filing the lawsuit.

Concordia Parish Assistant District Attorney Ann Siddall said the district attorney’s office does not have the expertise nor the resources to handle the case if it goes to court but would assist the jury in finding legal representation. Siddall said the court costs could be covered in a judgment to be paid by D&D Drilling, if the jury is successful in a lawsuit.

In other news from the meeting:

-The jury voted to pay Jordan, Kaiser & Sessions engineering firm approximately $42,000 for engineering services related to the ongoing Concordia Parish drainage project.

Engineer Doug Wimberly updated the jury on the project — which will receive $4.5 million in funding — and a recent meeting with the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness (GOHSEP).

Wimberly said GOHSEP asked the parish to submit a letter requesting approval of the release of funding for design services related to the hydraulic structures that will be used in the project.

The project, which is designed to alleviate parish flooding, will essentially drop the water surface level heading into the Vidalia Canal by two feet. Structures will be built to take water from northwest area of the parish through Brushy Bayou and dump it into the Tensas River

-The police jury lifted the burn ban in the parish.

Ferrington said recent rainfall had eliminated the need to keep the ban in effect.