South Dakotans Unite -- Tell Transcanada to Hit the Road

Folks up around Britton, in northeast South Dakota, have organized into "Dakotans Concerned" to oppose the placement of TransCanada's Keystone pipeline across farms and other private land, as well as the strongarm tactics TransCanada is using. The group has a website, but they don't have a lot of time to update it: they're having to throw heart and soul (not to mention life savings) into fighting off the lawyers. Here's the story from Britton resident Lillian Anderson [personal communication, 2007.09.30]:

TransCanada has filed eminent domain on us and 8 others at the beginning of September. I think there will be more in October. We don't think they have the right since they don't have permits from the state or the federal government. But unfortunately, they seem to have more rights than anyone who has paid taxes in this state and to the USA for many years. They will not sign the easement but say we can sue them for damages. If you look up the Valdez spill from the 80's, you will see that they have not paid anything in all this time. I am sure my trying to sue TransCanada would be just the same.

We sure could use donations. We have sent out newsletters trying to warn landowners about this company and the threats that they have made since day one. They call it negotiations. They come to the farm without an appointment and say they need the easement signed right now. They don't want you to take it to your lawyers.If you don't want to sign, the land agent says that the landowner "will get nothing" because you can't fight TransCanada because they have "deep pockets".

And that's exactly TransCanada's corporate strategy: pay lots of lawyers out of their deep oily pockets, file lots of papers, and just beat down all the regular working (and retired) South Dakotans who can't compete with big corporate money or legal trickery.

TransCanada doesn't need our farm land for its pipeline. The PUC can still tell them to build it along I-29, where there's already noise and disruption of normal land use. An I-29 route would also bring the closer to the proposed Hyperion refinery in Elk Point (even though TransCanada VP Robert Jones is in that Sioux Falls paper today telling us they haven't "negotiated any shipping contracts or connection contracts with the proposed Hyperion refinery or any other proposed refinery"... right).

Toward that end, South Dakotans need to unite against TransCanada's efforts to push us into serving their corporate needs. To that end:

1. Send some help to the folks at Dakotans Concerned. Chip in for their legal fees, donate a little website maintenance, give them a little love on your blog, whatever you can do.
2. Refuse to cooperate with TransCanada. If you're a South Dakotan, stand up for your fellow landowners and citizens. That should include TransCanada's Pierre lawyer Brett Koenecke, named in the company's PUC application as its main South Dakota contact. Sure, business is business and lawyering is lawyering, but come on, Mr. Koenecke: do you really want to be associated with a company that pushes South Dakotans around? You're a South Dakotan (and, according to your résumé, a Lutheran to boot!) -- how about some love for your own people?
3. Get the governor on board. Call his office, tell him to protect the people who elected him. And don't fall for any economic development arguments. I have yet to see the report that shows that the pipeline brings any solid, long-term economic benefits to this state. In TransCanada's eyes, we're just a big empty space in their way.
4. Reject this common carrier argument. TransCanada says its pipeline qualifies as a common carrier under South Dakota law (see SDCL 49-7-11) and thus can invoke eminent domain. Just what of the general South Dakota public's persons, property, or messages is TransCanada offering to carry? Where are the intake hookups where Mabel in Clark can pour in her maple syrup and transport it to cousin Frieda in Freeman?

Corporations like TransCanada will do anything they can get away with. They don't think, "It's only wrong if we get caught"; they think, "It's only wrong if we get caught, if we can't buy off the people who catch us, and if the folks we harm can outspend us and outlawyer us." We need to draw the line here and say to TransCanada (and every other amoral corporation) that their privilege of doing business not supersede our rights as American citizens. TransCanada, hit the highway, specifically I-29 -- either build your pipeline there, or take it all way back to Canada.

Gee, Doug, that law against corporate personhood is looking better every day...