Today the Public Utilities Commission hosts the first of five public input meetings concerning Iowa-based Summit Carbon Solutions’ proposal to lay 469 miles of pipeline across East River to carry carbon dioxide from ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, and South Dakota up to an underground sequestration site in central North Dakota. The commissioners (with State Treasurer Josh Haeder replacing Commissioner Kristie Fiegen due to Fiegen’s declared conflict of interest from pipe proposed to cross her sister-in-law’s land) will take public input today in Onida, then Wednesday in Sioux Falls, Thursday in Dell Rapids and Redfield, and Friday in Aberdeen:
- Tuesday, March 22, 2022, 5:30 p.m.: Sully Buttes High School gym, 500 S. 8th St., Onida.
- Wednesday, March 23, 5:30 p.m.: Ramkota Conference Center Washington Room, 3200 W. Maple Street, Sioux Falls.
- Thursday, March 24, noon: DeSmet Event Center, 705 Wilder Lane, DeSmet.
- Thursday, March 24, 5: 30 p.m.: Redfield School auditorium, 111 E. 6th Ave., Redfield.
- Friday, March 25, noon: Ramkota Hotel Northern Room, 1400 8th Ave. NW, Aberdeen.
Summit Carbon Solutions will present dog and pony first; then the PUC will hear views, comments, and questions from any interested persons. Of course, you don’t want to go popping off about problems with the CO2 pipeline that don’t exist the way Senator Lee Schoenbeck did, so do your homework first: you can read Summit Carbon Solutions’ application— complete with total route map, alternative routes, topographical maps, soil maps, land use maps, and reports on wetlands and threatened and endangered species—in PUC Docket HP22-001.
The PUC’s notice of these public hearings also includes notice that the deadline to apply for the newly harder-to-get party status in this CO2 pipeline permit application process is April 8. You don’t need party status to speak at this week’s meetings; you just need party status to participate in the formal hearings before the PUC (testifying, submitting evidence, cross-examining witnesses, filing motions, and preserving your right to appeal the PUC’s decision in court).
After short discussions with ABC and as many co-denizens leaning towards change, (not talking about any government ‘transparency’, or any other word vomit spewed by the talking heads who no longer value a single vote like our governess) I’m talking about real democracy-in-an-open-air-plaza type shtuff, I think we are well equipped with an ever-young constitution that allows us to modify and evolve with the times.
In other words, lets get up to snuff on the People’s government, by us, for us. With the technology we all have, without exception, we no longer even need stupid, trifling representation. We are all capable of representing our own voice and it being instantly tallied. For everything.
We are capable to casting secure ballots with our devices. We do not need to elect liars to go off and misrepresent us in our state and nation’s capitals. We can just as easily program algorithms and think engines which take each of our ideas on bills and laws and appropriations and organize them by majority of needs based on individual input, as well as input from law enforcement, judicial patterns, medical trends, travel and public census, etc. All kinds of graphs and stats could be at our fingertips, in real time, all the time. No more nefarious get-togethers, enormous deals without consent, c0ck-handshakes at our expense and to the detriment of our planet. We are all in it together and people will feel welcomed into the intelligent conversations regarding governance. Much like DFP.
This would mean we all would have a constant direct role in our government. We all would have direct views of all areas’ polls, we’d be unobstructed to drop our little grain of sand into the bucket of our choosing. Alls we need is revolutionary action and a team of exceptional IT programmer-type patriots to develop this concept that could oh, please- oh, please- oh, please save our state, country, and democracy itself from perishing from the good earth.
South Dakota could be the birthplace of (contemporary)democracy. And a place we are all free to live on living land.
New iowa poll shows 80% oppose use of eminent domain for carbon pipeline while 65% strongly oppose that use.
iowa public utilities board schedules public hearing for middle of harvest season 2023 making many landowners mighty unhappy.
https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2023/03/15/pipeline-permit-hearing-will-be-held-during-harvest/
link for above comment.