What happened at Tuesday's meeting in Baker City:
Straw poll: Build power line somewhere else
Written by MIKE FERGUSON Baker City Herald March 04, 2009 10:59 am
The Baker County citizens group Move Idaho Power took a straw poll among the roughly 85 people gathered for its second-ever meeting Tuesday to help convince the company to locate its proposed 500 kilovolt transmission line somewhere else.
The question: should the line traverse about 70 miles through Baker County, or should it instead follow the so-called Buchanan route, an existing energy corridor through Harney County?
All but one person surveyed selected the second option — despite the fact that the company is not pursuing that route because it’s about 100 miles longer than the 298-mile proposal. At $2 million per mile in construction costs, that’s a cool $200 million extra.
“I will be blunt with you,” said Baker County Planning Director Mark Bennett, who’s been working on the county’s interest in the project since June. “Idaho Power says (the Buchanan route) is not feasible, and the Energy Facility Siting Commission (which will decide the issue for the state) said it does not appear to be feasible because it goes through a lot of Forest Service wilderness ground.”
Bennett said Baker County could push for the southern route, but it would “cause a breakup” of the five-county coalition of Oregon counties directly affected by the proposal: Baker, Malheur, Union, Umatilla and Morrow counties.
County commissioners from those five counties have been meeting with Idaho Power senior management and representatives of the Bureau of Land Management and Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife to hammer out an alternative acceptable to all parties.
“(The southern route) would bypass both Union and Umatilla counties, and Umatilla County has provided us the main leadership so far,” Bennett said. “It would put us down by our own lonesome self.
“If it’s not feasible, it won’t be looked at, and if we place all our eggs in the Buchanan route, we will be left out.”
Baker County Commission Chair Fred Warner Jr. said he was in meetings all day Tuesday with county commissioners from the four other counties and agency officials. Those meetings were closed not only to the public but to the media. . .
Warner told the group that he’s learned one thing from state and federal agency land and wildlife managers: sage grouse considerations trump human values. . .
The next opportunity for people to make their feelings known is at a hearing the Oregon Public Utility Commission plans to hold in Baker City. The meeting date has not yet been set, but it’ll probably occur later this month, Bennett said.
The PUC must decide only one issue: does the nation’s energy need require the new line be constructed? “The PUC wants to know why there shouldn’t be a new power line, not (host a discussion over) routes,” Warner said. . .
Move Idaho Power founder Nancy Peyron said that she and fellow members Diane Bloomer of Durkee and Curt Martin of North Powder have been invited to meet Monday in Ontario with Idaho Power officials and other citizens groups that are reacting to the company’s proposal. . .
“Idaho Power has their work cut out for them, but the good thing is they are going back to the drawing board and doing what they should have done at the beginning, getting an assessment done over where they should draw the line,” (Colby) Marshall (aide to Greg Walden) said.
That process, the company told Marshall, will take several more months. Then the company will be ready to file a permit application with the attending opportunity for public comment. . .
You can read the entire article: http://www.bakercityherald.com/Local-News/Straw-poll-Build-power-line-somewhere-else
