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Dillsboro settles first-ever claim

By Rose Hooper
Dillsboro Town Board settled its first-ever personal injury claim, according to town clerk Herb Nolan.

At the town's July 3 meeting Nolan announced that the claimant, an elderly lady from Gainesville, Ga., had settled with the town for hospital expenses only. The claim originated from her fall last spring on the Dillsboro foot bridge across the creek.

"She was coming across on the south side, with her arms full of camera equipment, when she tripped at the point where the wood ends and the asphalt begins," Nolan said.

Originally, owners of the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad thought the accident occurred on their property and were the ones who called the ambulance. However, Nolan said, the bridge is actually town property, so the town took over responsibility.

"At the emergency room the lady was treated for a dislocated shoulder and a crack in her collar bone," Nolan said. "When she went back to Gainesville, her doctor X-rayed the area, confirmed the dislocation and crack, and kept her arm in a sling."

While the town paid the emergency room bill, Dillsboro's insurance company, which is contracted through the risk management pool of the League of Municipalities, picked up the tab for the physicans' bills and the claimant's subsequent physical therapy. That total was $1,200.

"The lady was very nice about the whole thing and never had any intention of suing the town," said Nolan, who immediately spray-painted and marked the rise for others to notice. "It has since been resurfaced. Our insurance company said there wasn't grounds for a case anyway since the rise on the bridge was only 3/4 of an inch. To have been negligent, it would have had to be at least 2 inches,"

As far as the current board can remember, this was the first-ever claim on record for this tourist town incorporated in 1889.

In other business Monday, town board members passed a resolution that, except for gross negligence, exempts them from claims of liable, including worker's compensation, by those contracting with the town.

"Although they are not employees, this covers us when we hire folks like Jim Parker for paving or Eddie Stephens for backhoe, or when we contract out mowing for the town," said Mayor Wade Wilson.

Back to Archive: 07/06/00.