Legalectric

I’d requested information on the Lab USA project from MPCA and City of Red Wing, and got some info last week:

Hey Red Wing — MPCA’s Lab USA documents here!

And they granted an extension for Comments due to the delay in providing primary documentation for review (DOH!) — Comments are now due January 19, 2017:

Lab USA’s Ash Processing Facility – Red Wing – EAW – Comment period extension (p-ear2-119c)

Hiding in the MPCA’s EAW, Appendix B, is this map, above.  The map shows the Water Tanks Burial Mounds, and the western end of the area is about 1/2 of the Red Wing Laydown Yard and Crusher site.  Oh my!  I’d noticed that factoid and included in my comments for the Tyler Hills Neighbors (p. 14):

Comments -_Tyler Hills Neighbors & Exhibits

Note the Red Wing Laydown Yard and Crusher site, on the right hand side of that clearing:

They also want to run a drainage ditch through and put ponds in that area — note they did NOT include the ponds in this depiction of drainage plans!

Here’s one with the “ponds” (no real plan yet, City of Red Wing is supposed to file that before they build it!) and note that the scenic easement as depicted here is further south than it is in another map, where the scenic easement overlaps the southern edge of the clearing (all of these maps are from the EAW, fyi):

Turns out I’m not the only one that noticed that encroachment of the Red Wing project (click for document or larger view):

Comment Letter – Dept of Administration

Look at that, “direct consultation with the Office of the State Archaeologist and the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council…”  Do ya think Prairie Island Indian Community might be interested, have an interest?!?!

Here’s the Comment from the Indian Affairs Council (click for document or larger view):

Comment Letter – Indian Affairs Council

OK, time to get to it.  There were THREE releases from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency today related to the Red Wing/Xcel Energy/Lab USA ash mining project.  THREE!

The ash mining project’s EAW:

Lab USA’s Ash Processing Facility – EAW (p-ear2-119a)

My friends at Xcel are miscalculating my schedule, sending the guys with the boom trucks over on a Friday without a deadline!!!  HA HA HA HA HA HA and not only that,

Yeah, give ’em the raspberries…

Today they’re taking out the poles across the street so they can start on the mother of all retaining walls.  We do now have a distribution line in the front yard.  Where’s that gauss meter?

Did you know that they saw down utility poles?  Odd, I figured they’d take them out and resuse them.  Here they’ve sawed the support pole in half, then took it down and are sawing it up into little chunks.  So small that I’ll bet they haul them over to their garbage burner here in Red Wing, or down to La Crosse where I know they burn railroad ties.  Railroad ties, penta poles, what’s the difference!

We’ve told the city that we LOVE the quiet at night, what a difference, and they were tickled that we thought they’d done something right (guess Alan and I are known around city offices).  There are deer back in da ‘hood again, one strolling down the middle of the dirt street, and somebody’s been eating the day lily buds.  We need to move some of the construction hazard lights closer.

Life goes on with construction… but work?  No way!

As ALJ Kathleen Sheehy said, “Oh, ENOUGH about the TREES!”

But soon, we’re losing another boulevard tree, this one a red maple, not too old, but it’s about 35 feet high.  ANOTHER ONE~  Last spring, we lost a large one in the May blizzard, and now, any day now, this one is coming down.  What’s adding insult to injury is that they’re taking it down FOR A TEMPORARY REROUTE OF THE XCEL DISTRIBUTION LINE ACROSS THE STREET!

They must have looked on a map, with input from Xcel found our house, and picked it.  They’re redoing West Avenue, replacing the VERY tall retaining wall across the street (20 feet??), narrowing the street to slow traffic, and putting in a sidewalk across the street so kids can walk to school.  We’ve been dealing with the City about this for a while, went to a meeting, checked the city’s packet on it, talked to them there, and had a conference or two in the yard this week.   And as Alan says, giving them full credit, “they’ve been responsive.”  Yeah, but they’re still taking our tree down.  And taking another one down when they redo the other street.  And they still haven’t replaced the one we lost last year in the blizzard, or the large one that came out some time before we bought the house. Four out of four…

When I spoke with the City and Xcel guys checking it out, I objected, I don’t want to lose this tree, and suggested undergrounding since they’re digging up the street, and they said this street wouldn’t work for that (oh, please…), and I again said I didn’t want to lose that tree, particularly for a TEMPORARY XCEL DISTRIBUTION REROUTE.  The Xcel whippersnapper looks down his snout and says, “You like power, don’t you.”  Folks, y’all would have been proud… I did not bring Kady out to address his attitude (the City guy sorta snorted at his comment, and the Xcel guy had clearly not encountered moi previously).

This tree is more than just a tree, it’s a safety infrastructure installation:

Our tree has been hit a few times, it’s at a curve near the crest of the hill, and people often race up the hill.   As you can see from the map, that tree keeps the cars out of our yard and out of Mary’s porch.  We need that tree!!!  SCREEEECH, CRASH… doesn’t happen often?  Well, just last year, someone coming the other way crested the hill too fast and on the way down didn’t make the turn, and they careened into the house on the other side of the street and took out their front steps!

And look:

And they’re starting in on it, the big “Utility Work Ahead” signs are out on West, and they’re climbing the pole across the street.  See that big honkin’ sucker there?  That one is coming out when they redo Sturdevant, which they said, “could be next year, could be a few years,” but that will mean we have NO trees left.

I can hear air tools all the way on the other side…

AAAAAAAAAAAAGH!  My tree…

City Pages screengrab from KARE 11

’bout time he got around to making it official…

Mayor Egan Resignation

Onward, and hopefully this time we’ll find a mayor with some integrity and ethics.