Right of eminent domain challenged
Last Updated: Dec. 21, 1999 at 4:04:53 a.m.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A legislator from Ladysmith offers a reply to
property owners like Tom Kreager who feel helpless about plans by public
utilities to erect towers for electrical transmission lines.
If the state Public Service Commission authorizes the construction, utilities
would be allowed by the right of eminent domain to use private property, even if
owners object.
Kreager envisions towers, wires and electromagnetic fields intruding on the
Marathon County neighborhood where he has a two-bedroom home.
"I've got to be concerned about the health of my son and my wife," he said. "I'd
have to sell at a loss and get the heck out of there."
He and Save Our Unique Lands (SOUL), a group opposing the power-line
proposal, acknowledge the eminent-domain rule allows governments to buy
property but say they were unaware the privilege can be used by private
businesses too.
Democratic Rep. Marty Reynolds said he checked state statutes and "sure
enough, it's been in there forever. Not just utilities but railroads, telegraph
companies, just about every business under the sun has the authority of eminent
domain."
Reynolds said he is preparing legislation to prevent for-profit businesses from
having the authority. It may have little success in the Legislature, he said.
Critics will perceive it "as antibusiness," he predicted. "I'd argue that it's not
antibusiness. It's pro-property owner, pro-taxpayer."
Minnesota Power Co. of Duluth, Minn., and Wisconsin Public Service Corp. of
Green Bay seek Public Service Commission (PSC) approval for erecting a
345-kilovolt transmission line 250 miles from Duluth to the Rhinelander area and
south to Wausau.
Kreager, 36, a copier service technician in Wausau, got familiar with the "Power
Up Wisconsin" project after finding a WPSC surveyor examining his 43-acre
piece of property.
The power line is essential because Wisconsin needs more electricity, the visitor
said.
The line would supplement an existing line between Minnesota and Eau Claire
and would provide electricity primarily to southeastern Wisconsin and possibly
Chicago, Kreager said.
Kreager, who has an associate degree in electronics from North Central
Technical College, said his research discovered WPSC guesses about 1,100
property owners would be directly affected.
His home is already only 600 feet from a 345-kilovolt line, he said. He has no
enthusiasm for new 90- to 130-foot towers whose wires hum and crackle in
humid weather, he said.
"Like being in the dentist's chair in the days of the old drills," said attorney
Edward Garvey who represents SOUL, which Kreager helped found and which
reports 2,000 members, many of them farmers.
WPSC began a campaign last month of business luncheons in Wausau,
Ladysmith and Tomahawk to advertise the importance of the project.
The line is needed "because the system we have now is basically the same one
that was built back in the late '60s and early '70s," says Dave Valine, WPSC
construction supervisor for the project.
"Electrical load growth has pushed the use of the Minnesota-to-Eau Claire line
to the limits of what it can possibly do," Valine said.
Kurt Gutknecht, editor of Wisconsin Agriculturist magazine who addressed
SOUL members last fall, said that "if it were my family's health, there is no way
on God's green earth I would let a utility company build a high voltage line within
several miles of my home."
"And there is no way I'd trust the measurements and advice of the government,
the PSC or any individual of any state agency."
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