Nebraskans File New Lawsuits That Could Stop The
Keystone XL Pipeline
by Emily Atkin
January 20, 2015
Tags: Keystone
XL Nebraska
WEB LINK: http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/01/20/3613050/two-new-keystone-xl-lawsuits/
Tags: Keystone XL, TransCanada
Nebraska landowners have
launched two separate lawsuits that, if successful, could serve to delay or
even stop the construction of the controversial Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.
The lawsuits, filed last week, represent Nebraska property owners’
second attempt to challenge the constitutionality of a law that gave the
Keystone XL pipeline a legal route through the state and, by extension, their
property. The landowners claim that TransCanada — the Canadian company that
wants to build Keystone XL — made direct threats to use eminent domain and
seize their land if they did not consent to having the pipeline run though it.
“We stand with landowners to protect property rights and a
constitutional pipeline routing process,” said Jane Kleeb,
director of Bold Nebraska, a group that has been at the center of the state’s
Keystone XL opposition movement. “While we fight to ensure TransCanada and the state of Nebraska
do not run roughshod over farmers and ranchers, we also call upon
President Obama to reject Keystone XL now.”
The law that is being challenged is called LB1161. The landowners say it is unconstitutional
because it allows pipeline companies, like TransCanada, to bypass the state’s
Public Service Commission (PSC) when seeking approval of their route through
the state and go directly to the Governor. The landowners say that the PSC,
which has a stricter permitting process, is the only entity with direct
authority to regulate pipelines under Nebraska’s
state constitution.
More specifically, the landowners say former Gov. Dave Heineman
“abus[ed]
the powers of his office … by taking away the authority from the PSC … and
instead [gave] the authority to himself to approve a pipeline and give a
foreign corporation the power of eminent domain before they have all their
permits in place.”
Dave Domina, the attorney
representing the landowners, told the Associated Press that the lawsuits are
very similar to the one dismissed last week by the Nebraska Supreme Court. In that decision,
four out of the court’s seven judges agreed with a district court’s February 2014 decision that LB1161 law was
unconstitutional. But according to Nebraska’s
constitution, the court needed the agreement of a super majority — five out of
the seven judges — to officially throw out the law.
The decision by the Nebraska
Supreme Court effectively confirmed that the 1,700-mile pipeline, which would
have the capacity to carry up to 830,000 barrels of Canadian tar sands oil per
day, has a legal route through the state. But the court left
it open for the route to be challenged in court again, which is what the
latest legal challenge represents. The first lawsuit took about three years to
resolve in the Supreme Court — attorneys for the landowners say the latest lawsuits could take about two
years.
According to the Associated Press, federal agencies have
until February 2 to give advice on whether to move forward with the pipeline.
Meanwhile, the Senate is expected to vote on legislation to approve Keystone XL’s construction sometime this week. President Obama has
vowed to veto the legislation.
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