Final Day for Lambuth University
Lendon Noe has been an art professor at Lambuth University for 27 years. As she entered her last days at the university, she said she just wanted to make certain all her eligible students would graduate. “I’m trying to clean out the department, trying to work on my computer. I’m trying to finalize my grades, trying to back up my hard drive and the utilities go off,” added Noe. Noe, who is a second generation Lambuth graduate, said grades were not due until the end of Thursday, and that is why she thought she still had time. “Those of us, still here, have lived through three years of unbearable stress, and they couldn’t even give us an hour warning,” asked Noe. Stakeholders from JEA, West Tennessee Healthcare, Madison County and the City of Jackson offered Lambuth almost $6 million for the campus, but Lambuth’s Board of Trustees said that is not enough. The university owes Radian Assurance, a bond company $5.3 million alone. Officials at JEA said Lambuth owes them $438,332.28, in past utility bills. Since Lambuth officially shut down on Thursday, they were forced to begin disconnecting as soon as possible. “This has been a sort of a work in progress. It has taken a lot of months to get us to this point. The reason it takes the bulk of the day is because there is so many meters and so many accounts,” explained Bruce Dorris, the Commercial Relations Manager for JEA. Dorris said Lambuth has more than 150 meters that must be shut down, that includes water, waste waster, electric, gas and phone lines. They also said, they are working carefully in case they get the call they have been eagerly waiting on. “We are preparing all of those services to be flipped back around to be turned back on in a very short amount of time,” said Dorris. Late Thursday morning, JEA workers said their managers told them to halt their shutdown. But about two and a half hours later, they were able to resume their work. The campus is expected to be completely shut off by tomorrow evening. Although, many believe, Lambuth will now be forced into bankruptcy which could add months to a final deal.
