Power line lawsuits halted

From the March 28, 2002 Record-Review (Marathon/Edgar/Athens Area) http://centralwinews.com/recordreview/ Power line lawsuits halted Two of three suits tossed out due to mail technicality Marathon County Circuit Court Judge Vincent Howard on Monday dismissed two of three lawsuits challenging the Wisconsin Public Service Commission decision to build a 250-mile Arrowhead-Weston electrical transmission line across northern Wisconsin because utilities involved in the case, namely Wisconsin Public Service and Minnesota Power, were served notice of the lawsuits by regular first class mail, not certified mail, as required by state statute. Howard halted the lawsuits brought forth by Wisconsin Environmental Decade and anti-power line group, Save Our Unique Lands (SOUL), but a third lawsuit brought forward by the Citizen Utility Board (CUB) will go forward. Glenn Stoddard, attorney for SOUL, faulted utility lawyers for purposely trying to snare the anti-power line lawsuits with a technicality, instead of arguing the case on the merits. "This is chicken crap," said a frustrated Stoddard to a group of nearly 80 SOUL members who filled to overflowing the Branch 3 courtroom, spilling out of the benches and seats in the jury box. Stoddard alleged that attorneys for Wisconsin Public Service and Minnesota Power, after receiving notice of the lawsuit, waited out a 30 day notice window before declaring faulty service, instead of asking his law firm for certified mail notices. Stoddard said that he expects that on June 5 Howard will allow individual landowners to join the CUB lawsuit, as well as allow Environmental Decade and SOUL to enter briefs in the CUB lawsuit as a friend of the court. "All the substantive arguments in this case will go forward," said the attorney. Stoddard, after apologizing to the SOUL membership for the certified mail slip-up, praised Howard for a reasonable ruling and said he felt that the judge was ready to try what promised to be a long, complicated case on the merits. He said that WPS attorney Trevor Will erred by irritating Judge Howard and forcing him to dismiss the case on a technicality. "This judge wants to get to the merits of this case," he said. "What we saw today is nothing but a nonsense motion. Trevor Will set himself up for a bigger loss in the end." Further, Stoddard said that his firm, Stoddard and Garvey, Madison, would roll up its sleeves and skirmish too by using technicalities. "We will find every piece of legal language and jam it to them," he said. During arguments before Judge Howard, Stoddard said that Minnesota Power has proposed a new Arrowhead-Weston transmission line route through Douglas County, as a reaction to a Douglas County Board committee decision not to allow the utility to survey for the new line. Stoddard concluded that Minnesota Power and Wisconsin Public Service would have to return to the Public Service Commission and ask for a new route, reopening the Arrowhead-Weston docket and making the pending lawsuits meaningless. "If we return to the PSC for an amended order, that would make all of this moot," he said. Attorney Will argued that Judge Howard needed to pay attention to the details of the Marathon County lawsuit, not events in Douglas County. "It's fair to say we are looking at all our alternatives."" he said. "It is hard to know what the companies will do. What could happen is several months or a year away. The issue here is whether the court has subject matter jurisdiction over these issues." Will said that it was uncontested that the Garvey and Soddard law firm failed to notify parties by certified mail, a clear violation of the statutes. "You either do it right or there is no subject matter jurisdiction," said Will.