Pittsfield — Inside the courthouse, the financial deal was sealed. Outside, there was coffin, pallbearers, a procession, a eulogy.
There was a funeral.
Because today was the day the Commonwealth and Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. formalized their agreement about how much the Kinder Morgan subsidiary would pay the state for two miles of conservation forest in Otis State Forest in Sandisfield, where it plans to install a natural gas storage pipeline as part of the Connecticut Expansion Project.
The price tag on that state-owned land, after months of haggling, turned out to be $640,000. The total compensation amount, including money for the state to secure additional conservation land and environmental mitigation fees brings the total for the state to $1.2 million.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the project, which would extend the company’s existing natural gas pipeline infrastructure across three states – New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts – and see four miles of new underground pipeline.
But expanding the existing pipeline corridor requires clearing forest purchased by the state for conservation and put into protection under the Department of Conservation Resources (DCR) and Article 97 of the Massachusetts Constitution, a simple law that wants the state’s residents to have access to open, undeveloped land.
Healey’s office put up a fight last spring over the company’s plan to seize the land. Tennessee Gas had the blessing of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the backing of the Natural Gas Act of 1938. But Judge John A. Agostini ruled that federal law trumps state law in such cases and applied eminent domain, allowing Tennessee Gas to have the easement.
But Tennessee Gas wouldn’t get it for free, and this is money paid for its encroachment into a forest in the town of Sandisfield that many thought was untouchable and is considered some of the state’s most pristine nature. The easement sits at the edge of an old growth forest.
And this deal — for this land, at least — is done.
“Can the state come back for more compensation?” Agostini asked the four Tennessee Gas attorneys and the two state attorneys.
Tennessee attorney Jim Messenger and assistant attorney general Matthew Ireland both said “no.”
Many of the “mourners” at the mock funeral on Park Square outside the courthouse were saying more could have been done to protect Article 97 and the land, which is very near old growth forest.
So after the roughly 40 protesters filed out of the courtroom. I asked Katy Eiseman, Director of Stop the Pipeline Massachusetts Network, after the final judgment hearing whether the state could have done more.
“They didn’t appeal,” she said. But she went on to explain that Tennessee Gas now has its own protracted battles for water quality certificates and other local permitting. The company was supposed to have this pipeline ready to go last fall.
Further roadblocks have been revealed, and are being addressed, as well: Native American ceremonial stone landscapes that pervade the area.
Eiseman also pointed out that FERC is missing one commissioner, and so doesn’t have quorum for making upcoming decisions.
Then there is the town of Sandisfield, population 800, which will, when construction begins, have the company’s heavy equipment descend upon it. Pipeline company lawyers and Sandisfield’s attorney had drafted but not signed an agreement with Sandisfield officials, stipulating about $1 million in compensation for wear and tear to the town’s infrastructure and reimbursement of $40,000 in town legal fees to negotiate with Tennessee Gas. The company has since reneged, and though there have been attempts made, there appears to be no recourse from the state on this.
It’s all very sad, as anyone outside the courthouse could see, just before the hearing. About 75 mourners, many dressed in formal — theatrical — funeral attire made a procession led by bagpipes. All courtesy of the Sugar Shack Alliance.
The Rev. Sarah Pirtle of Shelburne Falls Interfaith Ministry officiated. “This is a funeral for trees,” she said, sounding a bit like Dr. Seuss. She connected these local pipeline actions with those larger waves of protest moving through the country, and said these were in solidarity with Standing Rock and the “women’s marches.”
“The trees call out to us and they name us their dearly beloved,” she added, criticizing attitudes that “turn the earth into things and sticks.”
Jean Atwater-Williams of Sandisfield Taxpayers Against the Pipeline (S.T.O.P), gave a eulogy for Article 97, which she said, “was born more than four decades ago,” because the state realized that “certain lands are so special, so precious.”
“They knew that tests would come,” she added. “Temptations” from “an industry used to getting its way.” She said the state had “traded public trust for pieces of silver.” Article 97 is dead, she said, and added she hoped the forest would “haunt” those who made this happen.
On the coffin was written, “Rest in Pieces.”
There were a bunch of signs that said, indeed, Article 97 was dead.
But is it really, I asked someone.
“Not dead,” said Laura Kay of Northfield. “But compromised in this case, and we intend to defend it.” She said she wanted state officials to know that “it’s not acceptable to take payment” for land protected under the constitution.
Ed Stockman of Plainfield said if the state allows its most highly protected land to leave its hands in such a manner, “it’s just temporarily preserved until the federal government wants to give it to some corporation.”
This prompted me to ask the man standing next to him why he was holding an American flag.
“What could be more patriotic than standing up for America’s soils, forests and air,” said Morgan Mead, who had traveled all the way here from his Franklin County town of Wendell, which, like Sandisfield, has few people (848) but many trees.
