Three and a half years after an oil spill at Panther Valley Intermediate School, courts are still deciding who was responsible for the leaky oil tank that caused it.

Panther Valley is currently suing a contractor and an architect who installed an oil tank at the Panther Valley Intermediate School back in 2006.

In 2015, the tank failed, spilling oil on the property. The district in turn sued an architectural firm which oversaw parts of the project, as well as an HVAC contractor who installed the oil tank. It is seeking $450,000 from each.

On Thursday, attorneys for all three parties appeared before Judge Joseph J. Matika in Carbon County Court as the architectural firm, The Architectural Studio Ltd. of Emmaus, asked for Panther Valley’s claims to be dismissed.

Architectural Studio’s attorney, Cory Taylor, stated that his client’s contract with the school district said they could not be sued once the company’s services were substantially completed.

None of the parties knew there was a problem with the installation until the oil leak occurred. The tank would have been covered under warranty, but the company that manufactured it refused to honor the warranty because the tank was backfilled with sand, not gravel as specified in the company’s specifications. However, they are unable to agree on whose job it was to read those instructions.

The attorney for Yanuzzi Inc., the company that purchased and installed the tank, said his client has installed hundreds of tanks just the same way, and he’s never experienced a failure like the one at Panther Valley.

The school district sued Architectural Studio as well as Yanuzzi, because they were in charge of “contract administration.” The district argues that TAS was responsible for getting all contract documents from the contractors on the project, including the warranty for the tank.

Yanuzzi has in turn sued the Architectural Studio

Architectural Studio argued that if Yanuzzi didn’t turn over the warranty, it isn’t responsible.

Judge Matika asked TAS’s attorney whether he thought TAS had an obligation to ask for the warranty.

TAS’s attorney pointed out that Panther Valley hired its own ‘clerk of the works,’ who was on site each day and would have been better equipped to identify the problems with the installation.

None of the parties had any idea there was a problem with the tank installation until the tank broke in the summer of 2015.

Matika further pointed out that there was testimony that once the tank was ‘backfilled’ with sand, it sat exposed for months and a contractor other than Yanuzzi actually did the final fill.

The company that manufactured the tank visited the site shortly after. When the company learned that the hole dug for the tank was filled with sand, it said it wouldn’t honor the warranty.

Following the hearing, Judge Matika will weigh whether or not to grant the motion for summary judgment.

However, the attorneys in the case said they have agreed to bring the case before an arbitrator.

If they reach a settlement, the case in Carbon County Court will be dismissed.

Matika said he would agree to hold off on issuing a decision until the arbitration is complete.