Plans for one of Bee Cave's largest development districts, The Backyard, just ran into another snag. Outlier Energy, LLC, a company that alleges it had a duty to design and implement the project's energy source, filed a lawsuit July 20 in Travis County District Court, naming The Backyard Partners and co-developer Christopher Milam as defendants. A bit of history

Although multi-use district The Backyard was originally approved in December 2014 by Bee Cave City Council to offer movie and sound stages, the plan changed this past December when developers traded the project's cinematography focus in favor of two data centers and a distributed energy center, or power plant, that will be used to provide energy to the entire project.

Developers broke ground June 24 on The Backyard, 13891 Bee Cave Parkway, which includes a music venue, a hotel, offices, parking garages, data centers and a distributed energy center. On July 25, with a tie vote, City Council denied developers Christopher Milam and John Paul DeJoria’s proposed site plan for the project’s infrastructure, necessitating them to refile the plan and delay its progress. The lawsuit

The complaint, or lawsuit, alleges Milam approached Austin Energy in 2014 to provide electricity to the proposed project that, at the time, included movie studios. However, since The Backyard was at the outer edge of the utility company's service area, the project would require "extensive upgrades," making its cost too great, the document states. Outlier was contacted to design the project’s distributed energy center and performed work toward that end, it states.

Outlier's complaint states The Backyard developers violated agreements to not disclose its trade secrets, to not hire competitors, and was “unjustif[iably] terminated.”

The filed documents state that Outlier owner Chris Whipple received a text from Milam that said, "You're fired."

Outlier, in its complaint, is also seeking damages for not being paid for the services it rendered to The Backyard project, and is asking the court for a “temporary and permanent injunction” to stop The Backyard developers from disclosing Outlier Energy’s proprietary work product and trade secret information to any third party,” including another entity The Backyard may have brought in to finish the design work.

Milam was served with notice of the litigation July 26.

“I am still shocked by the lack of professionalism and loyalty displayed by Milam toward those that worked the hardest to bring The Backyard Project about,” Whipple said to Community Impact Newspaper in an email Aug. 7.

Developer's response

Milam told Community Impact Newspaper his company “never signed a contract with Outlier Energy.”

He said his development team began searching in 2016 for consultants with “expertise to assist in designing the tri-generation plant at The Backyard.” Outlier was recommended to Milam as for the project, he said, and “the plans they were putting forward ..kept changing.”

Milam said the developers “made a decision at some point to switch to Schneider [Electric].”

“It’s very disappointing to have this drag on our time and resources, so we certainly intend that Outlier reimburse us our legal fees along with any damages,” he said.