By: Jacob Kessler
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
jacob@thevillagereporter.com
A three-day jury trial has been set for April 6th through 8th, 2026, in the civil case between The Ohio Art Company and the City of Bryan (Bryan Municipal Utilities). The next pretrial is scheduled for March 2nd at 10 a.m., with discovery to be finished by the end of this year.
Ohio Art filed suit in 2023, claiming Bryan Municipal Utilities overcharged the company for water it never used.
The complaint listed six causes of action, including negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, and unjust enrichment. Ohio Art says it paid substantial sums over a period of years for water not consumed.
In April 2025, Judge Reeve Kelsey ruled in favor of BMU on five of those claims, leaving negligence as the only cause of action moving forward.
Bryan denied the allegations, and in a June 2023 letter, city officials cited local rules limiting recovery to one year of overcharges and offered just over $48,000. Mediation was attempted this summer in 2025 and proceedings continued with the August 29th pretrial.