The head of the Iowa Utilities Board says there’s a limit to the questions that can be asked by attorneys for landowners who don’t want the Summit Carbon Solutions pipeline on their property.
The Utilities Board hearing on Summit’s application to build the pipeline is in its fifth week. Board chairman Erik Helland is citing a district court ruling about a previous pipeline hearing. He said it gives the board authority to limit cross examination of witnesses that is repetitive.
“The board will continue to restrict and run a very tight course,” Helland said this morning. “…We have clear authority to limit unduly repetitious testimony.”
Bret Dubinske, an attorney for the company, said not everyone is going to “get the last word” on every point that’s raised during the hearing. “In any hearing of any kind — in this board, in a court — there will always be new testimony coming out and if we always said, ‘Well, everybody gets a response to that,’ you would literally have this never ending back and forth and back and forth,” Dubinske said, “and that clearly is not how hearings work.”
Brian Jorde, an attorney for landowners, aired his objection. “Any party is allowed to ask questions of any witness. That’s the rule,” Jorde said. “It’s as simple as that.”
Pipeline opponents had planned to have the director of the Science and Environmental Health Network testify today through an online platform, but the Utilities Board recently ruled all those who testify have to do so in person. David Skilling of Algona took the stand this morning to air his objections to having the pipeline on his property. He’s concerned about a rupture and a lagging emergency response.
“There’s so much that’s being left unsaid. We don’t know about the plume. We don’t know anything about the emergency reaction,” Skilling said. “…Summit tells us they’re going to do that, but I say the road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
Another landowner testified Summit had moved its proposed route on his property in response to his suggestions, but moved it back when he did not agree to sign an easement giving the company access to his property.