Power plant forum location raises questions
Opponents of a coal-operated power plant that is being proposed by Duke Energy for construction in Rutherford County were hoping a public hearing on the matter would be in a populated area like Charlotte, Asheville, Raleigh or Wilmington. They were disappointed when organizers selected Statesville to host it.
Protesting are (from left) Mike Cherin, of Union Mills, Stephanie Rayburn, of Sylva, and Rachel Pickett, of Asheville.
The four-hour event, which attracted hundreds of people on both sides of the issue, was Thursday night in Statesville High School's Mac Gray Auditorium.
"I think they held this in Statesville mainly because it cuts out all the major media," said Avram Friedman, a member of an environmentalist group called the Canary Coalition.
"We implored them to hold the hearings in a large metropolitan hub, and they told us that Statesville was a compromise," Friedman continued. "But I think holding it here violates the spirit of the law, which states that the hearing should be held in the communities most impacted by the plant."
The Statesville public hearing was the second one in the past week dealing with an air quality permit revision for a coal-fired boiler Duke is building at its Cliffside Plant in Rutherford County.
The first one was held Jan. 15 at a high school in Forest City, near the proposed plant.
The hearings were held by the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources, whose responsibility it is to deny or grant the permit.
Tom Mather, a DENR spokesperson, said Statesville was chosen for the site for a number of reasons.
He said its location was ideal in its proximity to North Carolina's major cities. Also, the Mac Gray Auditorium fit the bill.
"It's within two hours of Raleigh, Charlotte and Asheville," he said. "And we were looking for a location that could accommodate the crowds we expected and that wouldn't cost us $10,000. And this was perfect."
The majority of the nearly 300 people in attendance were there in support of the plant, including Greater Statesville Chamber of Commerce President and CEO David Bradley.
"Arguments that come from extremism rarely have value," Bradley said, apparenty alluding to the relative handful of those there in opposition to the plant. "I can tell you that this department (DENR) never rubberstamps projects, especially one of this magnitude."
Bradley praised Duke for its efforts in producing affordable energy and its place in the community.
"Sometimes we get caught up in an us against them argument," Bradley said. "But Duke is not us and Duke is not them. Duke is we."
But Ulla Reeves, with the Asheville-based Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, said the good, in this project, will be outweighed by the bad.
"When they tell you this is clean," Reeves said, "what they mean is that it's the cleanest of the dirty."
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Friday 23 January 2009 - 11:13:35
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