The Sabal Trail roadshow rolled on to Florida, but hasn’t
bowled over at least one landowner.
Dave D’Marko wrote for mynews13.com yesterday,
Pipeline bringing gas, concerns to Floridians,
A new gas pipeline is coming to Florida that will pump up to a
billion cubic feet a day to Florida Power and Light customers.
But some property owners aren’t happy. The company plans to take
the pipeline right through their land. Sabal Trail Transmission met
with landowners in Kissimmee Tuesday night. Another meeting is
planned at South Lake High School in Groveland Wednesday.
Gertrude Dickinson, 82, got her first letter in June, warning her a
company was bidding to bring a gas pipeline to Florida and her
property was being considered. She didn’t wait for the project to
gain approval, which it did later in the summer, and started
fighting it immediately.
“I said I want a map of exactly where you are putting that pipe on
my land and how much you are going to use,” Dickinson said.
She said what she got in return was this map showing all three
states the 465 mile pipeline would go through, and a dot showing the
general area she lived in Sumter County. What it didn’t explain is
why they wanted to go through her land, and not the state-owned
prairie across the street.
Well, that all sounds familiar.
And look who’s down there speaking for Spectra:
Andrea Grover, a spokesperson for Sabal Trail Transmission, is part
of the “Right of Way” team meeting with 3,000 landowners along the
corridor. She said so far 80 percent have given permission for land
surveying.
But Dickinson posted no trespassing signs, refusing to let surveyors
on her land. Signs on her property point out she suffers from a
condition known as auditory recruitment, which means noise from
construction would be greatly amplified in her ears. She says
previous episodes have led to heart attacks.
The company said it will reimburse owners fair value for their
property, but Dickinson doubts that would be much in this economy.
“I can buy a few bags of groceries with the money and that’s it,
and for what? They’ve taken my property, and my entrance, and my
life possibly who knows,” she said.
-jsq
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