Phil Gramm wants to route power lines through our new state natural area

[pmbryant]

To protect the view from his new Texas Hill Country ranch!

:grr:

And this isn't just any Texas state park (though that would be infuriating enough): this is Government Canyon State Natural Area, a newly-preserved slice of spectacular Hill Country in the midst of rapidly expanding suburban sprawl west of San Antonio. The park is nearly 8,000 acres, which is a very large park by Texas standards (except for the huge parks way out west in the Big Bend area).

It has taken a coalition of dedicated people decades to preserve this wonderful piece of land for everyone's enjoyment. It is finally slated to open to the public next year. I have been spending a lot of time out there the last couple years helping to build and maintain a trail system, so the place is very close to my heart.

Recently, I learned from the rangers at Government Canyon that our local utility ("CPS") was considering routing a new power line right through the heart of the park. I was confused why they would even consider this defamation of a showpiece park and natural area, especially since the city of San Antonio (which runs CPS) has been very supportive of the Government Canyon conservation movement over the years, even purchasing adjacent land to help buffer the park from future sprawl.

Then I read this column from a well-respected local columnist (Carlos Guerra) in today's San Antonio Express-News. The relevant, blockbuster (to me, at least) sentence is near the very end of the article.

http://news.mysanantonio.com/story.cfm?xla=saen&xlb=980&xlc=1079097&xld=980

(snip)

Critics charge that CPS' routing process is now being manipulated by powerful interests who are pushing to have it &l;the major new transmission line&r; traverse the Government Canyon State Natural Area so the scenic view from former Sen. Phil Gramm's new Hill Country ranch won't be spoiled.

(snip)

This would explain a lot, but it makes this whole mess especially infuriating.

Anyone's advice about how to fight these kind of battles (protecting state parks from inappropriate development and/or pressuring utilities over transmission line routes) would be greatly appreciated.

--Peter

[Catherine Vincent]

1. So all that just so the view from Graham's ranch won't get spoiled?

I don't know what can be done at this point but maybe start a petition and get the local channel involved. This would be bad publicity on his part unless he doesn't care. But if that is a heavily republican area, there may not be anything you can do about it. Good luck.

[pmbryant]

3. The Govt Canyon people have asked for a letter-writing campaign

Fortunately, the local newspaper appears to have latched onto this issue. I suspect they are planning on doing a (big?) story on this soon, since they had some reporters and a photographer out at the park last weekend.

Don't know what the local TV stations are doing about this, since I don't watch them, but it is definitely a good idea for us to try to get them involved.

The city of San Antonio is not heavily Republican at all, so our best hope is via CPS, I would guess. Going the state route, to get Texas to protect one of its showcase parks, is likely doomed since the GOP controls everything. And state parks weren't exactly well-treated even before the GOP took over.

Thanks for your help.

--Peter

[Gman]

2. Carlos Guerra is great

He'll expose all the dirty little things that no one wants you to know. Here's one.

Phil Gramm ha always been a worthless greedy bastard and obviously still is.

[pmbryant]

4. Yep

Guerra is a great resource on San Antonio politics and other issues.

--Peter

[Oilwellian]

5. I was involved in a battle similar to this

It wasn't only going to affect the Appalachian Trail and national forests, the power line was going to cross through my property. So as you can imagine, I was VERY concerned and active against it. The purpose of the powerline wasn't to provide more power to our community. The utility company wanted to tap into the game of selling electricity to other states. If Bush's Energy Bill is passed, eminent domain will fall out of the power of states and into the hands of the Feds. Try fighting the federal government instead of local officials who are far more accountable to voters.

From the article below, you will see it takes a concerted effort to fight the very powerful energy companies. I suggest you get many environmental groups and the State Park system involved in this battle. Good luck.

<snip>
Powerline Across the A.T. — Resolved

Forest Service Issues Final Decision on AEP Transmission Line

The Forest Service released the Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and the Record of Decision to allow the proposed 765 kV transmission line to cross the Jefferson National Forest in southwest Virginia. The crossing will be a single one, in the same location where the A.T. is crossed by I-77 in Bland County. While negative impacts will occur, this is the least-impact alternative for the A.T. More details are available on the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests Web site.
December 31, 2002

Issue Background

Since 1990, the Appalachian Trail Conference and the Roanoke A.T. Club (RATC) have been seeking rerouting of a 765,000-volt powerline, with its huge towers, proposed by American Electric Power (AEP, formerly APCo) to run from Wyoming, W.Va., to Cloverdale, Va., terminating at a substation just east of the Appalachian Trail. The Trail community's position is that the line should cross the Trail only once, in an appropriate location. The proposal and various alternatives could have affected up to 34 miles of the Trail directly and 84 to 115 miles indirectly.

In 1992, a Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC) hearing examiner approved a proposed route with minor modifications to reduce the impacts on the Trail, but West Virginia officials rejected the route application for lack of information. Three years later, Virginia officials asked the utility to evaluate alternatives that would remove the line from Carvins Cove along the A.T. and avoid crossing Sinking Creek Valley, also crossed by the A.T.

In June 1996, the Jefferson-George Washington National Forests and the National Park Service issued a draft environmental-impact statement that stated their preference to deny permission for the line to cross federal lands, because the impacts were too significant and could not be mitigated satisfactorily.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

http://www.appalachiantrail.org/protect/issues/powerline.html

[pmbryant]

7. Thanks!

I appreciate the advice and thanks for posting this article.

--Peter

[burr]

6. Phil Gramm and Zell Miller are two of akind!!

native born Georgian bastards...:pals:

[cally]

8. Good luck with this Peter

It seems everyday these powerful repukes just get more and more bold. I keep wondering what they will try next.

I'm glad the local paper seems to be willing to write a story about this. I think most of the populace will oppose this but I haven't judged these things too well recently. :eyes:

[pmbryant]

10. Thanks, cally

Public land is in short supply around here and this is a magnificent piece of it.

One problem is that, due to the complete lack of state funding for parks in Texas, this park is not open to the public yet. Most people around here have probably never heard of the place. They don't know (yet) what they have.

Ever since I moved here in 1998, it seems the opening has been "one or two years away". The current scheduled opening is November 2004, "one year away".

--Peter

[Ilsa]

9. Thanks for the bad news.

I'll also sic my husband on this as he loves the Hill Country. He hates Gramm almost as much as I do since Gramm is a goddamned useless greedy draft-dodging-poor-excuse-for-a-human-being-prick. Did I mention he is sonafabitch? And I hate his wife also.

We'll do what we can.

[pmbryant]

11. Appreciate any help we can get

Thanks, Ilsa, and thanks also to your husband!

--Peter

[bearfartinthewoods]

12. work up a press release

a NON-PARTISAN summary....if the park is what is important, you do not want to turn away allies.

keep it short. include location and description of the trails. and the proposed route and how much of the park will be impacted. be truthful.

include email addresses and telephone nubers of you state version of puc or whoever regulated electricity, your state recreation departement, the state and federal reps and senators in who's districts the parks lie as well as the senior members of appropriate state house and senate committees that oversee recreation and power/utilities.

send it to every hiking forum on usenet use a throwaway email account to do this because usenet is lousy with spammers harvesting emails.

also search on 'yahoo groups' for hiking and backpacking groups, join a few active ones and post your story and ask for help.

check out all the websites you can manage to check in the following googles:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=texas+hiking+trails&btnG=Google+Search

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=texas+backpacking+trails&btnG=Google+Search

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=trail+protection+texas+hiking&btnG=Google+Search

look for forums or anywhere you can post the story.

write to

http://lonestar.sierraclub.org/houston/news/index01.htm

start now. this type of thing takes time to get started

keep me informed . i may be able to help once you get started.

[pmbryant]

15. All fabulous ideas

Mountain biking groups, as well, I think. I'm not much into off-road mountain biking, myself, but many of these trails (not all) will be open to bikes once the park is open to the public. A relatively small area of the park (700 acres or so, but they are planning many miles of trails in those 700 acres) will also be open to horses, so there's another user group that may be particularly interested.

Many thanks, BFITW!

:thumbsup:

--Peter

[Blue_Roses]

13. Phil Gramm is a whiney

old fart. I thought he was out of the picture.

[Octafish]

14. Wendy and Phil Gramm are stooges of the BFEE.

She and her turd husband are tied with the Bush Organized Crim Family from BCCI to ENRON:

EXCERPT...

Not content simply to deregulate energy markets, Enron deregulated futures markets, making itself exempt from government oversight and from fraud laws. This manoeuvre, headed by Wendy Gramm (who moved back and forth between the Chicago Board of Trade and the Enron board) and assisted by Phil Gramm (who pushed Enron-friendly changes in legislation in Congress), was tantamount to the company giving itself permission to launder massive amounts of money. Which it did.

CONTINUED...

http://freebie.multiservers.com/enr.htm

[pmbryant]

16. Here's the article in the San Antonio Express-News about this

It's the 2nd lead article on their home page, so I imagine it's on the front page of today's paper.

http://news.mysanantonio.com/story.cfm?xla=saen&xlb=180&xlc=1080724&xld=180

Power line idea shocks some

By Christopher Anderson
San Antonio Express-News
Web Posted : 11/07/2003 12:00 AM

An uproar from landowners including former U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm — along with pressure applied by some powerful politicians — has persuaded City Public Service officials to reverse course and consider building an enormous power line through a state-owned nature preserve.

The city-owned electric utility is studying whether it can cut a swath up to 150 feet wide through the Government Canyon State Natural Area in Northwest Bexar County to make way for a transmission line that would stand as tall as 200 feet.

CPS officials admit they are examining the route through the wilderness area even though it would exceed $28 million — the highest price for any of the proposed routes.

Some powerful forces have lined up behind infuriated landowners in Bexar and Medina counties whose property is located near where the utility first proposed to build the high-voltage and highly visible power line.

Representatives of Republican U.S. Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison, and U.S. Rep. Henry Bonilla, R-San Antonio, in the past few weeks have contacted CPS officials and questioned why the utility wasn't considering going through Government Canyon.

Supporters of Government Canyon say politics and greed have endangered their dream of a publicly accessible preserve that protects San Antonio's drinking water and offers an unspoiled retreat close to the city.

(snip)