Talking points (version 2/2/10)

For public comment meeting on the Draft Environmental Impact Statement

Regarding Xcel’s Hiawatha Project proposing high voltage lines along the Midtown
Greenway or nearby
(talking points provided by the Midtown Greenway Coalition)
Meeting details: Wednesday, February 10, 2010, 6:00 p.m.
at Plaza Verde (1516 E Lake St)
The meeting is being held by the MN Dept. of Commerce

Everyone who testifies should start out by saying:

• Your name.
• Who you are affiliated with if that is relevant, for example “I’m a volunteer with
the Women’s Environmental Institute, a group that focuses on environmental
justice issues here in the Phillips Neighborhood” or whatever.
• Where you live.
• Make sure that you tell some of your own story before, during, or after you
address some of the points below, explaining how would the Hiawatha Project
impact you personally?

Good things about the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS):

• There are many references to putting the high voltage transmission lines
underground to mitigate impacts.
• There is a reference to spreading the extra cost for underground lines over a wide
group of rate-payers to avoid the environmental justice problem of making local
people pay for it.
• The DEIS recognizes that overhead lines along the Greenway or underground
lines on the Greenway’s south shoulder would negatively affect plans for future
rail transit in the Greenway, or perhaps preclude it altogether.

Problems with the DEIS:

• Not enough attention paid to electric and magnetic field impacts on health.
• Inadequate response to neighborhood concerns about the Hiawatha West
substation site that would take away an important greenspace on the Greenway.
• Energy conservation is not addressed as a potential mitigation measure, but it
should be in order to keep the lines and substations from expanding in the future.
Ideally, the whole project should be avoided with conservation, alternative means
of generating electricity locally including solar, and smart grid to tie it all
together.

Overall messages to get across:

• Don’t mess with the Greenway or our neighborhoods, final decisions should be
respectful.
• If the lines have to go in, put them underground.
• Regarding Hiawatha substation, don’t put the substation there, save our
 greenspace on the Greenway.
• Energy conservation should be a part of this project.
• Environmental justice:
• Communities most impacted by the aesthetics and potential health risks
are primarily low-income and people of color.
• If the lines go in and are put underground instead of on overhead towers,
the extra cost for underground should be paid for by the widest set of rate-
payers possible, such all metro, or all state, or Xcel’s entire midwest region.

To potential members of the public, bring all your friends even if not everyone plans to
speak. It is important that the room be packed with an overflow crowd.

To read the DEIS: http://energyfacilities.puc.state.mn.us/resource.html?Id=25732

One final note from Tim Springer, Executive Director, Midtown Greenway Coalition—
So as to keep our karma clean and improve the environment, we should all be noting the
number of kilowatt hours that we buy from Xcel each month, and challenge ourselves to
reduce this.