With James Bell whose Mitchell Co. land is being bulldozed right now. He made a video statement which we will post later.
The Valdosta Daily Times sent a reporter to this event, Protect Withlacoochee River from Sabal Trail @ US 84 2016-09-17, #NoDAPL, #NoSabalTrail, #WaterIsLife. The reporter indicated a story would probably appear Monday or Tuesday.
Update 2016-09-26: The VDT story appeared Friday.
There is no excuse for Continue reading
Update 2016-12-09: Here are directions to Suwannee River Campsites at 30.414, -83.159167. Facing the boat ramp, up to your right you’ll see a trail head. Follow the trail into the woods along the river bank. The river bends left, then right. Shortly after the right bend is the crossing, at 30.407379, -83.156494. Sabal Trail has marked its path in the woods; stay off of their easement but follow it until you come to a field where you should be able to see the HDD site. Send back lots of pictures. For maps and aerial pictures, see Sabal Trail maps digitized. Much more information here. And you may want to ask the CEO of college-savings mutual fund Virginia529 why her company is the biggest mutual fund stockholder in the stranded investment of Spectra Energy.
Yes, Sabal Trail wants to cross the Suwannee River IN Suwannee River State Park.
How many pipelines do we want? Continue reading
Update 2016-09-23: Sabal Trail protests continue, Valdosta Daily Times, 2016-09-23.
Update 2016-09-17: James Bell with WWALS at Withlacoochee US 84 bridge.
Update 2016-09-16: James Bell of the family being bulldozed right now by Sabal Trail will be at the US 84 Withlacoochee bridge with us 9AM Saturday morning.
Get in the picture on the bridge with boats at the proposed pipeline crossing in the background, on US 84 over the Withlacoochee River, half way between Quitman and Valdosta, GA. You, and the news media, too, are invited this Saturday 9AM! You may have seen Tuesday’s Suwannee River action on WCTV; you can come join us at the Withlacoochee River Saturday. No Dakota Access Pipeline #NoDAPL, No Sabal Trail #NoSabalTrail, #WaterIsLife.
Help demand the Army Corps re-evaluate its permit for Sabal Trail just like its permit for the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). Both pipelines should be canceled: keep it in the ground!
This WWALS Outing is part of the Continue reading
Update 2016-09-24: Video from the river and pictures from the bluff.
You are invited to protest Sabal Trail and the Dakota Access Pipeline this Tuesday 5:30 PM! News media are invited. Walk with signs along the bluff to the proposed Sabal Trail Suwannee River HDD crossing, or paddle downstream and back.
We aim to get pictures and video of people on the bluff, beach, and river
at the same time demanding the Army Corps re-evaluate its permit for Sabal Trail
just like its permit for the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL).
Both pipelines should be canceled: keep it in the ground!
This WWALS Outing is part of the #NoDAPL Day of Action — Tuesday Sep. 13, tying the Dakota Access oil Pipeline to the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline through their ownership by the same companies. This outing is also a followup to Continue reading
Hahira, GA, September 6th 2016 — Two Georgia brothers are stuck with paying almost ten times as much in Sabal Trail’s legal fees as they spent defending their property against that invading fracked methane pipeline, even though FPL apparently admitted this year that all three of its 2013 excuses for that pipeline are no longer valid. Two federal agencies and numerous state agencies issued permits based on those excuses. Sabal Trail used those permits to get eminent domain, including to drill under rivers in Florida, Georgia, and Alabama and through the fragile limestone containing our drinking water in the Floridan Aquifer. It is time for this unnecessary, destructive, and hazardous boondoggle to be shut down and its $3 billion in FPL ratepayer money to be used for solar power in the Sunshine State.
James Bell, one of the brothers stuck with having to pay Sabal Trail attorney fees, says:
"First and foremost, this is a multi-billion dollar company that is for profit. In my personal opinion I don’t see how a private for-profit company should be allowed eminent domain. I don’t understand that. That makes no sense to me. I might could understand it if it was for the greater good of the country but this is not. And it is certainly not the federal government or the state government building some road or highway."
Florida Power & Light claimed Continue reading
Sierra Club Campaign Organizer Merrillee Malwitz-Jipson has taken the Lake City pipe yard ball and run with it. Monday she got TV coverage at that illicit Sabal Trail storage yard for 36-inch fracked gas pipe, and today she’s called a press conference and protest there. Plus Sierra Club has filed two legal actions. Here’s how you can help.
Haley Wade, WCJB-TV, Gainesville, Florida, 15 August 2016, New pipeline has protestors,
There is something you can do: you can say no.
The Chair said they would send a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and everyone applauded,
in the middle of a record number of people speaking
Tuesday morning to the
board of the Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD),
most against Sabal Trail, among other topics.
Please send names of the unidentified speakers to contact@wwals.com.
And you can still send your message to the SRWMD board via
Robin Lamm, Coordinator, rrl@srwmd.org; in the Subject say SRWMD Board Members; and remember to copy Noah Valenstein, Executive Director, NVD@srwmd.org NDV@srwmd.org.
(Thanks to Merrillee Malwitz-Jipson for the updated Coordinator name and address.)
Below are links to each of the videos, followed by a video playlist. These are the complete videos of everything before the lunch break, except for a camera failure at the beginning of one talk. See also the Agenda and board packet.
Continue reading
Filed Friday as FERC accession number 20160708-5096,
http://elibrary.ferc.gov/idmws/file_list.asp?document_id=14476452,
“Two new reasons for a USACE Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement and a halt to Sabal Trail permits; see also accession numbers 20160708-5089 and 20160708-5088, by WWALS Watershed Coalition, Inc. under CP15-17.” (PDF) Continue reading
Who other than Sabal Trail needs a yard full of 36-inch pipe?
A pipe yard apparently built on top of jurisdictional wetlands,
so WWALS has informed the Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD)
and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE).
Here is PDF and below is text and images of the letter WWALS sent to the Corps today.
July 5, 2016
Continue reading
