Legalectric

(really, that’s their “site plan” — how informative!!)

It’s in the news, Concerned River Valley Citizens’ suit against LS Power, Lent Township and Chisago County had a hearing last week.   Short version:

Judge Hoffman said he wanted to be armed with sufficient information to make a decision. He asked for just one thing – a written transcript of the legislative discussion that preceded the adoption of the legislation regarding the tax exemption in 2009, specifically subdivision 92 pertaining to the obtaining of the development agreement.

He asked the attorneys to write a letter to the court when it is provided and then he will make his decision.

The judge believed this information is important and he can’t be obligated to make a decision until he knows what the legislation said about approval of a development agreement “before” the start of construction.

Most committee meetings now are available online, and the legislative library provides tapes.  One problem is that the legislative intent is rarely conveyed in the committee meetings, and all the behind the scenes doings aren’t going to see the light of day.

The statutory section at issue – Minn. Stat. 272.02, Subd. 92.

Here’s the Summons and Complaint from last June:

CRVC -Summons and Complaint

For more info, go to www.stopsunriseriverplant.com

From ECM Post Review:

Judge asks for one thing in power plant civil case

Wednesday, 06 October 2010

By MaryHelen Swanson

In courtroom 202, Tenth Judicial District Judge John C. Hoffman heard from attorney Douglas Sauter of Barna, Guzy & Steffen, Ltd., representing the CRVC and Carlson, and three attorneys representing Chisago County, Lent Township and LS Power (Sunrise River Energy) respectively.

The CRVC and Carlson have filed a civil lawsuit against the three entities named above in connection with the siting of an electric generating power plant in Lent Township.

The attorney for Chisago County, separately retained, explained to the judge the proposal by LS Power and the coalition’s argument that there is no pre-emption to county zoning ordinance. The county’s attorney says there is pre-emption.

The attorney showed the judge the legislation enacted in 2009 that required a development agreement and host agreement before tax exempt status is granted.

The attorney said in his opinion, the county, as well as Lent Township, did nothing wrong, it was what they needed to do.

The CRVC and attorney believe that the cart has been put before the horse and argues that the sequence of events is wrong.

Attorney Sauter provided Judge Hoffman with background on the proposal, which has LS Power constructing a 780 MW natural gas-fired electric generating plant on 40 acres in Lent Township, property adjacent to the substation off County Road 14.

Giving details of the LS Power proposed project, Sauter told the judge the presence of such a large plant would destroy the nature of the community and Carlson’s ability to sell high end lots in his nearby development.

The process, he stressed, is important.

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s nice to win sometimes, even in absentia…

Tonight the Chisago County Board of Commissioners, on a 3-2 vote, voted NOT to approve their proposed Development Agreement with LS Power for an 855MW (give or take a few hundred, depending on their mood, what they ate for lunch, whatever) natural gas electric generating plant.  Like WOW!

Congratulations to Concerned River Valley Citizens for a job well done, and thanks to Tom Dunnwald who filled in for me tonight, but this is no time to let up — the work’s not over — there’s still the matter of the need for an Overlay Essential Services Ordinance that addresses generating plants and whatever other noxious infrastructure somebody might come up with.

This LS Power mess is the PROCEEDING that Concerned River Valley Citizens intervened in, under the Minnesota Environmental Rights Act, and were shut out by the County Attorney, Janet Reider (bad idea), and we just filed another Notice of Intervention yesterday or today.

There were some interesting comments, like “we’ve done the best we can in the time we had” indicating some sort of train schedule that has now been derailed.  They tried to prevent attorneys from speaking, and the worst of that came from Commissioner Ben Montzka, who is an attorney himself!  He should know better…

In the packet for tonight’s meeting:

Development Agreement

Host Fee Agreement

Host Fee Allocation Agreement

It’s all on video, so we’ll have that soon.  I can’t wait to see the snippets on YouTube!

Here’s from KARE 11:

(it’s not up yet)

More later

From ECM article…

On Monday, citizens of Lent Township organized a Special Meeting, as allowed under statute, and told the Town Board what they thought of LS Power’s Sunrise River Energy Station.  The hands raised you see in the photo is the vote telling the board that they should not approve a development agreement with LS Power.

The people say NO, but the township, the following day, went ahead and approved the Development Agreement:

Power Plant Gets Township Approval

And a view from the trenches:

We the PEOPLE – found in the Fish Lake Karpa

And here’s the report from the Post Review:

Citizens’ vote was to nix power plant

By MaryHelen Swanson

There were a few empty chairs, but if those standing at the back of the room had all wanted to sit, the attendance would still be considered “standing room only.”

lent meeting1.jpgThat was the scene at Lent Town Hall Monday night as a special citizen-petitioned meeting got underway.

The folks were divided by Lent residency and non-residency.

There were separate sign-in sheets and designated seating areas.

Called to order by Lent Township Clerk Laura LeVasseur, it soon became the people’s meeting when they elected Mark Koran moderator.

First order of business was the Pledge of Allegiance.

With the agenda adopted, resident Dave Milles introduced a resolution which was adopted by the people with no audible nays.

Milles went on to read the resolution.

It noted three things that were expected to happen that night:
• openly and publicly review and discuss the final draft of the development agreement by and among Lent Township and Sunrise River Energy, LLC (also known as LS Power) prior to any official vote of the Lent Township board to approve and/or sign the development agreement;

• to present and vote on a resolution requiring a public referendum on the question of approval or disapproval of any development agreement by the township and energy group prior to any official vote of the Lent township board to approve and/or sign the development agreement;

• and to present and vote on a resolution requiring Lent Township board to comply with the results of the referendum when taking any action or vote to approve and or sign the development agreement.

All of the above was accomplished Monday night.
Read the rest of this entry »

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Yes, and it’s about time — Concerned River Valley Citizens, who fought the Chisago Transmission Project for over a decade, have intervened in the Lent Township and Chisago County proceedings about this project.

Lent Township and Chisago County are negotiating a “development agreement” and as it comes together, WITHOUT PUBLIC INPUT, a lot of important issues are being decided that these local governments have no business or authority to decide without public input.  Lighting is within a township’s zoning jurisdiction, but light pollution, which will certainly be an issue, is also an issue for the PUC.   Noise is an issue for the ownship, but it is also under jurisdiction (with too loose standards) of the MPCA.  There will be an air permit, and I sure hope that puts limits on fuel oil use.  Any development agreement presumes that the plant will be built, and that’s not a presumption CRVC is comfortable with.

There are too many unanswered questions.  Where is the need for this plant?  Xcel’s not about to be buying any electricity from them anytime soon, and LS Power was shown the door.  What is proposed?  LS Power can’t/won’t even tell state regulators with any specificity, and they’ve been told go away until they’ve got something solid.

What are they proposing?  Hard to tell…  there’s no application to the PUC yet, which is another reason all this “pre-application” dealing with local governments is a problem.  They’re doing deals with local governments before it’s at all clear what’s proposed, and without knowing what’s proposed, so how can any agreements be made?  Who in the township or county has any experience with big natural gas plants and associated infrastructure like gas pipelines, water pipelines, transmission… well, some in Chisago County have a lot of transmission expertise!   We do know some things from public documents, i.e., the MISO interconnection queue documents say 855MW gas with fuel oil back up, the legislation passed, again, without public notice or input, specifies no more than 780MW Summer Capacity, and a recent LS Power presentation:

September 2009 – LS Power – Sunrise River Energy Station

The problem is that the local governments are making agreements, which include concessions and plans, without public input, and by making these agreements, they implicitly approve this project, with some conditions, which means that LS Power can move this project towards reality without the input necessary to thoroughly vet the application.  Who is Chisago County to make an agreement regarding water use when it’s also an issue within DNR jurisdiction?  They tried to pass the utility personal property tax exemption legislation without even letting local governments know the revenue impacts and how utility personal property tax Host Fee Agreements work, or that they even exist… so the question — who is protecting the public interest in all of these agreements?  Hence the CRVC intervention.

And just for the record, in one of the articles they quoted an LS Power rep as saying the only emission is steam.  WHAT??!!!???   Let’s see what your air permit application says… duh… let’s have a look at NOx… How stupid do they think we are?  STEAM?!?!?  Yeah, like the Prairie Island plant is a “steam plant.”

Here’s CRVC’s Lent Township Intervention:

Notice of Intervention – Cover

Intervention – Town of Lent

Exhibit A – MISO G135 Feasibility Study

Exhibit B – MISO Transition – Fasibility Analysis Posting G901-G999Exhibit C – June 16 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting Minutes

Exhibit C – June 16 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting Minutes

Exhibit D – July 30 – Hundreds attend meeting to learn about power plant

Exhibit E – February 17 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting

Exhibit F – May 19 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting

Exhibit G – April 21 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting

Exhibit H – July 21 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting

Exhibit I – August 18 Lent Township Board of Supervisors Meeting

And here’s CRVC’s Chisago County Intervention:

Intervention – Chisago County

Exhibit A – MISO G135 Feasibility Study

Exhibit B – MISO Transition – Feasibility Analysis Posting G901-999

Exhibit C – April 15 Official Proceedings

Exhibit D – County Attorney Correspondence

Exhibit E – Memo Chisago Co Environmental Services & Zoning

Exhibit F – Letter – Sunrise River June 30

Exhibit G – National Park Service Letter July 29

Exhibit H – Chisago Co Water Plan Policy Team Minutes August 10

Exhibit I – Technical Memo – Barr Engineering – Test Well 1 Geology and Well Summary

Exhibit J – Water Team Recommendation of EIS August 11

Exhibit K – Chisago Co Board Minutes August 19

Exhibit L – September 2 Official Proceedings

Exhibit M – Lent Land Use Regulation – Chapter 1