Canadian company behind the Keystone pipeline files
eminent domain proceedings against 90 Nebraska
landowners
TransCanada Corp., the Canadian company behind
the Keystone XL pipeline, filed eminent domain
proceedings against an estimated 90 Nebraska
landowners Tuesday to secure the right to build the
controversial project across their property.
“Today we initiated these actions in the state of
Nebraska, but that does not mean we’re done working
toward a voluntary agreement,” said Andrew Craig,
TransCanada’s land manager for Keystone projects.
“Our goal today is that, over the next six months,
we are able to address any concerns they have about
the project.... The current landowner will continue
to own the land.”
TransCanada’s legal filings are an effort to gain
what is called an easement — the right to construct
the pipeline on private land that others own. They
are the latest step in a years-long fight over the
project, which cannot go forward without President
Obama’s approval.
The $5.3-billion project would carry oil from the
tar sands of Canada through the nation’s heartland
and, after connecting with existing segments, to the
Gulf Coast. Much of the oil would be exported.
Nebraska is the project’s most contentious
battlefield. A 2012 law allowed the governor to
bypass the state Public Service Commission and give
the project the go-ahead. Approval for the current
route was granted in 2013.
In February, a lower court declared the law
unconstitutional and left the troubled pipeline with
no approved route through Nebraska. This month,
however, the Nebraska Supreme Court reversed the
lower court’s ruling and cleared the way for Obama
to act.
The Republican-majority Congress has made
Keystone XL one of its first priorities for 2015.
Obama has pledged to veto the bill, which would take
pipeline approval out of his hands.
Jane Kleeb, director of the anti-pipeline group
Bold Nebraska, said Tuesday that TransCanada had
spent the last six years “bullying” landowners into
signing away the rights to their land, but a group
of about 100 is prepared to continue fighting.
Landowners filed suit Friday, again asking a
judge to declare the law that allows Nebraska’s
governor to approve the pipeline’s route
unconstitutional and to stop TransCanada from
gaining access to the land.
Kleeb said the Nebraska Supreme Court allowed the
law to stand by default. Four of the seven justices
ruled that the law was unconstitutional, but five
votes were needed. Three justices refused to rule on
constitutionality; they said the landowners who
filed suit did not prove they had legal standing to
challenge the pipeline.
In this round of lawsuits, only landowners with
written proof that TransCanada plans to build the
pipeline on their property are involved. They have
not yet been served with eminent domain notices, but
they received a Dec. 15 letter announcing the
company’s final offer before notices would be filed.
“I didn’t appreciate getting a letter at
Christmastime saying, ‘Sign up now, because all
offers will be off the table,’” said Nancy Allpress,
whose family farm is bisected by the proposed
pipeline route and who will be part of the suit
against TransCanada.
“It’s our land,” said Allpress, whose farm has
been in her husband’s family since 1886. “This is a
foreign-owned company coming in and exercising
eminent domain against our will for a project we
believe is of no benefit to the United States.
TransCanada has behaved like bullies with
threatening tactics.”
Jeanne Crumly also plans to join the suit. The
farm she and her husband operate has been in his
family for more than 100 years, and they have
grandchildren who hope to operate it someday. On
Tuesday, Crumly broke into tears when talking about
what she views as TransCanada’s threat against their
livelihood.
Crumly said her family first heard from
TransCanada when a company representative called at
9:30 p.m. a few years ago to tell them that the
planned route would go through their land. At the
time, she said, TransCanada made them an offer that
was less than the price of a set of tires for an
irrigation rig.
The company’s final offer “was better,” Crumly
said. “But it’s not about the money.”
The pipeline “is simply a for-profit venture, and
they’re asking landowners to accommodate that,” she
said. “There’s no compelling reason whatsoever any
of us would want this to go through our land, our
state.... There is no benefit to our personal
property or our state.”
maria.laganga@latimes.com
Twitter: @marialaganga
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