SWANTON — Dozens of people came out Wednesday night to tell the federal government they don’t want NEXUS Gas Transmission to build a 255-mile pipeline across Ohio and into parts of southeast Michigan and southwest Ontario.
But few were pleased by the format the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission used to receive their comments.
Instead of a traditional public hearing, in which people air their views at a lectern in front of a large audience, FERC directed attendees into the Swanton High School cafeteria, instructed them to wait until their assigned numbers were called, then had one of two court reporters take down their comments in private, one-on-one sessions away from everyone else.
Many said it was almost like FERC didn’t want a repeat of a March 16 Ohio Environmental Protection Agency hearing at which a standing-room-only crowd of about 600 packed the nearby Waterville Primary community room over a controversial site selected for a major compressor station.
All who attended that meeting spoke in opposition, as did most — but not all — of those who met one-on-one with FERC court reporters Wednesday night.
“Now it’s all divide and conquer,” activist Deborah Swingholm grumbled.
Terry Lodge, a Toledo attorney representing several property owners who oppose the pipeline, called it “deplorable and deliberate shutdown of anticipated opposition.”
“They made it impossible for opponents to unite,” Mr. Lodge said. “We get to sit at cafeteria tables and wait for our numbers to be called.”
Providence Township resident Matt Meeker said he’s obviously not against business as chairman of the Anthony Wayne Regional Chamber of Commerce board of directors. But even he said the format FERC used is “obviously a way of toying with you.”
FERC officials running the meeting said that was not the commission’s intent.
Though the format took many by surprise, a description of it was found on a handout at the sign-in table, and on Page 4 of the commission’s draft environmental impact statement — a document recently released and the meeting’s purpose.
Adding to the confusion was sweltering heat and humidity that built through the evening inside the cafeteria. A FERC employee told people midway through the five-hour event she learned the school’s air conditioning was not working.
One person who told The Blade he would speak on behalf of the project was Jimmy Stewart, president of the Ohio Gas Association and one of the state’s biggest natural-gas lobbyists.
“Many of the concerns are overblown,” Mr. Stewart said.
He called pipelines “the safest and the most energy-efficient means of transporting natural gas” and noted how Americans walk and drive over hundreds of thousands of miles of pipeline each day without knowing it.
Activist Paul Wohlfarth said many people stayed home after learning about the format, figuring it was a waste of time.
Sean Shinaberry, a 35-year-old financial adviser who owns 32 acres in a part of Swancreek Township along the pipeline’s proposed route, attended but said he felt like he was “going through the motions.”
He said he went out of concern for his wife and their three young children.
NEXUS wants to build the project in collaboration with Texas Eastern Transmission, which operates a major pipeline in several other states. Both are subsidiaries of Houston-based Spectra Energy Corp.
The companies plan to pump natural gas from the Utica and Marcellus shale regions of eastern Ohio and West Virginia to markets in Ohio, Michigan, and Canada.
The Swanton meeting was the first of six to discuss FERC’s finding that the proposed NEXUS pipeline can be built without harming people or the environment.
Each begins at 5 p.m. and is scheduled to last five hours.
The next session is tonight at Tecumseh Center for the Arts, 400 N. Maumee St., Tecumseh, Mich., followed by one on Monday at the Quality Inn Fremont, 3422 Port Clinton Rd., Fremont. Additional meetings are scheduled for Tuesday in Elyria, Ohio; Wednesday in Wadsworth, Ohio, and Aug. 18 in Uniontown, Ohio.
Written comments will be accepted until Aug. 29.
Contact Tom Henry at: thenry@theblade.com, 419-724-6079, or via Twitter @ecowriterohio.
First Published August 11, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
