Permit approved for pipeline

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July 31, 2013 - 12:00 AM

Enbridge cleared a hurdle to start construction of its Flanagan Pipeline through the area when Allen County commissioners ratified a recommendation of its planning board to grant the company a special use permit Tuesday afternoon.
The permit was sought so Enbridge could build a pump station and related facilities on a 40-acre tract two miles southeast of Humboldt.
Enbridge intends to build a 600-mile-long, 36-inch pipeline to carry crude oil — from North Dakota, Montana and Canadian fields — from Flanagan, Ill., to Cushing, Okla. Oil will be stored at Cushing before distribution to refineries in several states.
The planners’ recommendation was for the permit to be granted, and included a provision for Monarch Cement Co. to restrict quarry blasting, when it begins in that area, to no closer than 300 feet of the property’s boundaries. Monarch owns adjacent land.
And therein comes the rub. Monarch is not eager to risk liability for what might occur from blasting, including flying debris that could threaten the pump station, although it will be enclosed in a “big barn-like structure,” said Enbridge’s Keith McLaughlin.
Enbridge first sought to purchase a tract owned by Monarch, but then shifted its interest to an adjacent 40 acres it purchased from Dale Daniels, which has been pastureland for years.
Meanwhile, the two companies remain in negotiations that may be close to giving Enbridge title to the nearby Monarch 40 acres, which would alleviate concerns about blasting.
Ed Bideau, Chanute attorney representing Monarch, asked commissioners to put off a decision on the planners’ recommendation, first for a month, then two weeks and finally a week, so negotiations for purchase of the Monarch property, which he said were near completion, could play out. Commissioners had delayed a decision two weeks earlier.
When a delay didn’t seem forthcoming, Bideau asked commissioners — sitting, he said, as a judicial body in the matter — only to consider evidence presented Tuesday. Instead, they took into consideration documents from the planning board meeting and previous commission meetings.
Commissioner Tom Williams also said he would lean on comments he gleaned from conversations with constituents.
Bideau was picky about the proceedings because of what may transpire.
If the two companies don’t strike a deal on adjacent land owned by Monarch, recourse might be an appeal to District Court of the commissioners’ approval of the special use permit.
Williams moved to accept the planners’ recommendation, noting the area “has an abundance” of pipelines and support facilities and that it is not unusual for a pipeline to run under farmland.
Also, he said, “pipelines in today’s world are significant to the area and to the country.”
Jim Talkington gave a second and Chairman Dick Works made acceptance unanimous.

BILL KING, director of Public Works, encouraged commissioners not to tap his department’s special bridge fund to help hold down the county’s overall tax levy for 2014.
Initial draft of the upcoming budget included an ad valorem tax levy increase of about 20 mills.
That had been pared to just over 16 by Tuesday and commissioners expect it to be lowered more before a budget’s final version is proposed.
“I’m not asking for more money, I just want you to leave what’s in the fund there,” King said of money that provides the county’s share for bridge replacement and pays for maintenance work.
King said a contract may be let later this year for a bridge over Owl Creek, about two miles west of Humboldt, and his plan was to replace the Indian Creek bridge, a mile and a half east of Neosho Falls, in 2014.
“We may try to stall that one,” he said.

IOLA Administrator Carl Slaugh said he was “continuing to mull over” the commissioners’ contract offer for Iola to run countywide ambulance service.
“I’m seeing more and more challenges,” he said. “I’m optimistic we’ll come up with the cost of equipment and facilities,” but has concerns about personnel issues.
Slaugh said he had talked at length with county ambulance crews, as well as those dispatched with city ambulances, and that some contentiousness had surfaced.
“The biggest hurdle is personnel and schedules,” he said, allowing that he didn’t think providing Type 1 service would be a problem. Type I service has a paramedic on board for each ambulance run, which has been the county’s approach for about five years.
Slaugh and commissioners may meet again before the next city council meeting on Aug. 12.

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