Legalectric

Association of Freeborn County Landowners had filed a Complaint against Public Utilities Commissioner John Tuma and Chair Katie Sieben:

AFCL files Complaint against Tuma & Sieben

They filed their response and shipped it off to Office of Administrative Hearings for an investigation (note statute says “hearing” … oh well…):

AFCL Complaint forwarded to OAH for hearing

Here’s the result, hot off the press:

There’s no requirement of public participation? Minn. Stat. 216E.08, Subd. 2. And parties? No mention. What’s the point of being a party? And following that Office of Legislative Auditor report, guess it doesn’t matter, no one is paying attention.:

Public Utilities Commission’s Public Participation Processes – OLA-Report

Notice of a new topic on the agenda isn’t required? Yeah, I guess the notice statutes don’t matter.

Talking to a participant is not ex party contact? The County is indeed a participant…

Next step is that it goes to the Commission to rubber stamp it.

Who cares? Listen to this:

Association of Freeborn County Landowners filed a Complaint with the Public Utilities Commission against Commissioner John Tuma and Chair Katie Sieben last week.

The PUC responded with this… oh my… and an Affidavit from John Tuma, he DID contact a Freeborn County Commissioner about pre-empting the township’s Ordinance and local control:

And under the statute, Minn. Stat. §216A.037, the PUC must refer it to the Office of Administrative Hearings:

The administrative law judge assigned to the ex parte complaint proceeding by the Office of Administrative Hearings shall conduct a hearing investigation and shall issue a report within 30 days after the matter is referred. If the administrative law judge determines that the report cannot be properly completed within that time period, the judge shall report that fact to the commission within the 30-day period and shall file a final report within a reasonable time thereafter, no later than 60 days after the referral to the Office of Administrative Hearings.

Minn. Stat. §216A.03

… so today, it was referred. GOOD!

Why? Well, this is about the July 16, 2020 meeting, the one where you just have to listen to the video – yeah, we’ve got the transcript, but the video just conveys so much more:

Today was the deadline for filing Exceptions to the Administrative Law Judge’s Recommendation for Line 3 Certificate of Need and Route.  Here’s the ALJ’s Recommendation:

Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law, and Recommendation

I quick filed an Exception on behalf of Association of Freeborn County Landowners, objecting to inclusion and objecting to any consideration of “System Alternative 04” or SA-04, because no notice was given to landowners in Freeborn County, and well, to any of the landowners along SA-04.

Association of Freeborn County Landowners_ Exceptions to Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Recommendation of ALJ

Friends of the Headwaters proposed SA-04, the only “System Alternative” proposed in the Certificate of Need proceeding.  … sigh…. foisting it elsewhere is not a good strategy.  Search their Exceptions for more info on their rationale – do a search for “SA-04” of this filing:

20185-142900-04_Exceptions – Friends Of The Headwaters

Are there others advocating for AS-04?  Looking… it’ll take a bit.

System Alternative SA-04 is noted 139 times in the ALJ’s Recommendation, and is first mentioned on p. 24:

And the Public Utilities Commission accepted it for further evaluation, but no notice was provided:

But no meetings in the area — and still no notice:

… sigh… on it goes…

And regarding the DNR’s take on SA-04 (will find DNR comment):

Here are all the other references to SA-04 in order — the ALJ does reject it, saying it is not a viable alternative:

And then the ALJ considers comments:

The DNR comments are troubling:

Here’s the actual DNR Comment:

201711-137640-01_DNR’s  Comment (SA-04)

The DNR said about SA-04:

And back to the ALJ’s mentions of SA-04:

The DNR changed its logo to the same boring one all MN agencies now use, UGH!

The DNR, after agreeing to a time certain for staff to testified, filed a Motion to Quash!!

DNR-Motion Packet

WHAT?  So I filed a response:

Response_DNR_Motion to Quash_FINAL

And the Administrative Law Judge told the DNR what they could do with their Motion:

Order_DNR Quash_20182-140121-01

And the meat of it:

Yeah… delightful… Now, can we get at why it is that the DNR, Dept. of Health, and Commerce do not want to testify in this docket?  Hmmmmm…

Slowly, the siting process for Freeborn Wind is moving.  The Commission issued its order referring the application to Office of Administrative Hearings for a contested case, that’s a first for a wind project in Minnesota!

PUC Order_20178-135140-01

Erratta_20179-135278-01 

And LauraSue Schlatter, the Administrative Law Judge, has issued the Order for the Prehearing Conference, and a directive to the Applicants to share a proposed schedule, which they have done:

OAH_Notice_20179-135289-01

The Erratta Order issued is particularly important because it specifies that the rules that this process will go forward under is Minn. R. Ch. 1405:

Minn. R. Ch. 1405 contains the rules for siting under the Power Plant Siting Act (and wind siting chapter, Minn. Stat. Ch. 216F, is NOT under the PPSA, which is Minn. Stat. Ch. 216E), and not the OAH more general administrative procedure rules, Minn. R. Ch. 1400.  Note there’s no mention of Minn. R. Ch. 7854, about which I’ve filed how many Petitions for Rulemaking because these rules are so deficient and inadequate?  This is seriously inside baseball — it’s a major change, major admission, and what are the implications?  I’ve wanted wind siting to be moved over to the Power Plant Siting Act forever… it was improperly separated out of 116C, without any directive or authorization, when PPSA became Minn. Stat. Ch. 216E.  There’s homework to do.

Here we go…