Appeal to the Lowndes County Commission 11/11/14

Tonight, on a rare Tuesday night off, I made a point of attending our County Commission meeting, and getting up at the "Citizens to be Heard" portion to make a plea for the Commission to pass a resolution against the Sabal Trail gas pipeline (check out spectrabusters.org, if you don't know what I'm talking about). I was thankful that it appeared the commissioners tuned into what I was saying, and it got a rousing response in applause from the gallery. Thank you to all who expressed your support.

At the end, Commissioner Raines told us that the no one on the Commission thinks this is a good thing for Lowndes County, but wants to do something "substantial" to prevent the pipeline from coming through. Other commissioners told us that they have been told, by what I assumed were Sabal Trail representatives, that this will be decided at a higher level than they, implying it is inevitable, why fight it?

They did bring up the need to take it to the next level and our state and national representatives. I specifically asked that the Commission to lobby our state and national representatives on our behalf, and feel I was assured this would be the case, to which I say, thank you.

Just remember, they told us the biomass plant was a done deal, yet we turned that back. I sympathize with the commissioners sense of powerlessness, and expressed my thoughts about that this evening. However, this pipeline is not yet a done deal. Now is the time for all the state representatives, especially the ones whose districts are affected, to bring this up in the next session of the Georgia Legislature. I'm looking at you, Dexter Sharper, Amy Carter, and Ellis Black. Also, get in touch with Austin Scott, Johnny Isakson, and the newly elected David Perdue, and tell them we don't need no stinking pipeline coming through Georgia and Lowndes County that has no benefit to the citizens of Georgia, and especially, Lowndes County.

Here is what I said to the commission tonight:

Chairman Slaughter, fellow commissioners,

My name is James Parker, I live at ___ in the city of Valdosta. 

I come before you today to humbly request that you follow in the footsteps of the Dougherty County Commission, and pass a resolution in opposition to the Sabal Trail pipeline passing through Lowndes County. 

This proposed pipeline provides absolutely no benefit to any citizen living in Lowndes County, nor, in fact, to any citizen living in the State of Georgia. Yet Sabal Trail wants, no, demands, that they be allowed to run this 36-inch pipeline through hundreds of private properties, taking a hundred foot wide path that the property owners can no longer have full use of, thus negatively affecting the value of their property. 

Over the last year, I have seen hundreds of property owners and their supporters speak at numerous meetings against this pipeline. Never once have I heard a local citizen speak in support of this pipeline. The only people I have ever heard speak in the pipeline's favor have been paid representatives of the corporation.

In my opinion, Sabal Trail has been less than straight up in its dealings with Lowndes County citizens. For example, Sabal Trail has fallaciously, and I would say deceptively, asserted eminent domain in its letters to landowners, in order to give Sabal Trail access to their properties to survey them. Lacking such consent, Sabal Trail has been known to trespass on the properties in order to survey them anyway. 

Why should the residents of Lowndes County, citizens like you and me, have to let this foreign corporation, Sabal Trail, run roughshod over us? Why do we have to kneel before their wishes? How is it that a single foreign corporation can have greater power and say than the hundreds of property owners and their supporters? Why should we living, breathing, human citizens have to yield and step aside and give up our property to this corporation and its pecuniary interests? Are we human beings now second class citizens in our own county and country? It looks to me, right now, that what a multi-billion company, that isn't even from here, wants to do trumps all the local citizenry, their wishes, and property rights. 

This august Commission are the elected representatives of the citizens of Lowndes County. I ask that you protect and defend the property owners and other citizens of Lowndes County against the onslaughts of this foreign entity.

Please, I ask, and even beg you, to pass a resolution forbidding this corporation, Sabal Trail, from ramming this pipeline through our county. It has absolutely no benefit to us in any way, shape, or form, yet it takes property away from our citizens, and is a threat to the people of Lowndes County and their property.

Thank you for your time