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Sheridan County residents press MDU for meeting on proposed transmission line; commissioners table action until September
Summary
Residents from Sandstone Circle, Little Goose and nearby subdivisions urged the Sheridan County Board of Commissioners to pressure MDU for a public meeting and to bury a proposed high-voltage transmission line that would run adjacent to their properties. The board agreed to postpone decisions and pursue a meeting with MDU.
Sheridan County residents told the Board of Commissioners on Aug. 5 that Montana-Dakota Utilities’ planned high-voltage transmission line would run within feet of homes in several new subdivisions, threaten property values and raise health and safety concerns. After more than an hour of public comment, the board voted to table two agenda items tied to that line and pursue a public meeting with MDU.
“MDU has changed and diverted from the current corridor,” resident Lori Goodman said, describing a route that would run “a half of a mile along undeveloped lands” and then drop near existing driveways. Goodman told commissioners she and neighbors believed subdivision covenants required buried lines and said they had not been notified of the new route. She asked the county to seek mitigation and “support to bury that transmission line as a mitigation project.”
Other residents echoed the request. Laurie Alexander said neighbors estimate significant losses to property values and noted several people have filed or planned formal complaints with the Public Service Commission. Tudor Marks said the neighborhood saw surveyors and learned of the plan only after the work began; Scott Wendt and others described financial and retirement impacts.
Commissioners discussed potential leverage over a utility that has already filed for state rate increases. An MDU rate case referenced by speakers was raised as a possible funding source; Goodman urged that “the first 4 to $5,000,000 that they get out of the rate payers” be used to bury the line. Commissioners said staff would try to bring MDU to a public meeting and that one commissioner had scheduled a meeting that afternoon with a local MDU representative, Chris Lawler.
The board approved a motion to table items JJ and KK (renumbered on the agenda as items 5a and 5b) until the first commissioners’ meeting in September to allow time to schedule a public meeting with MDU. The motion passed by voice vote.
