GLUE Member’s Report August 24, 2009

The FERC Hammer Has Arrived!

It’s been a quiet several months since GRDA submitted their proposed Shoreline Management Plan to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Initially, the FERC posed a list of ten questions to the authority for additional information and clarification. That resulted in a 204 page response by GRDA. Some of my GRDA contacts were even of the belief that FERC had a lot more of a problem with the proposed habitable structure situation on Grand Lake than they did with the proposed SMP. With the arrival last week of what the feds describe as an environmental assessment of the proposed plan, it’s now obvious nothing could be further from the truth.

The ninety page document (864k PDF) is available in this site for your review, but the really disturbing information starts on about page 66. Over the next couple of days, I’ll be sifting through the document page-by-page, but my initial take is as follows:

FERC places a great deal of weight on the wildlife demands and their self proclaimed expertise. Their opinions and recommendations seem to take precedence over all others. If there’s no data or study information in place, FERC is suggesting GRDA use wildlife findings. There doesn’t appear to be any evidence of equal shareholder status when it comes to wildlife interests.

The responsible growth zone is about to change with FERC recommending sub categories to more clearly define residential only and commercial development allowed areas…much like the original plan pushed by Kleinschmidt & Associates.

FERC wants more area defined as sensitive to serve as fish and wildlife habitat. They recommend areas suitable for development around Grove and on the West side of Monkey Island be reclassified as sensitive. That will certainly have a major impact on those areas as related to development.

They raise the dock density issue as one needing to be revisited. And you guessed it, they recommend the wildlife representative would be best suited to do this and possibly submit recommendations. This potentially could shut down areas of the lake to the installation of any additional docks.

If past performance is any indication, GRDA senior staff will roll over for FERC and just tell the public they had no choice. There is a thirty day window for public comment. If Easley and the GRDA board shows no inclination, which I doubt they will, to fight this to the end, we need a plan to turn up the heat. If that includes the petitioning the governor for more proactive board members and management personnel, so be it. Representative Cox is more than a little upset about the Grove area anti-development recommendations. I’ll have a more thorough analysis in a few days.

When we established GLUE, we said we wouldn’t ask you for your participation until absolutely necessary. I’m in the process of defining what our strategy might include, but letters to the FERC and a petition effort are certainly ones to be considered as well as the involvement of our elected officials. Public comments on the FERC proposals will be accepted until September 14th. More to follow!

Cheers