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No Columbia Wind Active

No Columbia Wind

Active public project helping landowners educate officials and, if needed, litigate over a proposed Columbia wind project’s effects on property, health, and safety.

  • wind
  • land-use

Earlier public path: /nocolumbiawind

Public slide presentation: The Responsible Wind project, on educating officials about how wind farms can affect property, health, and safety.
Project sections

The live page title is “No Columbia Wind.” It lists the status as active and the next milestone as phase 3. The hero on this page is the public No Columbia Wind graphic from the live projects list.

Summary

The public page says the project assists local landowners in educating public officials about a proposed wind farm’s effects on property values and on public health and safety. It says the education focuses on local government and the courts as ways to limit those effects, and that litigation to limit the effects, including stopping the project, is possible if needed.

The page describes the proposal as an industrial project with turbines about 500 feet tall. It states local concerns that include property values, tourism, legal liability, natural resources, endangered species, and quality of life. It also lists broader concerns the page associates with wind projects: noise, shadow flicker, wildlife collisions, habitat fragmentation, decommissioning cost, radar and communications interference, and grid intermittency. Those are the page’s stated concerns, not findings added here.

The page links to nocolumbiawind.com and mklaw.com.

Gifts to this project are donations to Five Stones Legal Defense Fund.

Milestones listed on the public page

The public page includes a long general guide to organizing local opposition. This summary keeps the phase names, completion marks, and figures the page gives for this project.

  1. Getting organized locally. Marked completed. The page lists $25,000. It describes gathering project and permitting details, forming a core group, and learning from other communities.
  2. Education and local opposition. Marked completed. The page lists $75,000. It describes public meetings, written materials, petitions, comments to decision-makers, and consultation with counsel on land use, environmental law, or administrative law.
  3. Model ordinances. Listed as the current phase, with a stated duration of about three months and a figure of $48,000. The page breaks that figure into ordinance counsel ($5,000), discussion of legal regulation ($5,000), drafting ordinances ($15,000), public education ($5,000), an amicae curiae brief in Massachusetts ($10,000), and administration ($3,000).
  4. Litigation, if necessary. The page lists about $240,000 over one to three years, including pre-complaint and complaint work ($50,000), a motion to dismiss and discovery ($50,000), summary judgment and trial ($100,000), and experts ($40,000). It says litigation is evaluated from the start and is not automatic.

Counsel named on the public page

The page names Gregory M. Erickson, Elizabeth Nielsen, and Erick G. Kaardal.

The public page marks phase 1 (getting organized locally) and phase 2 (education and local opposition) as completed. It lists phase 3, model ordinances, as the current milestone. It does not report a court judgment. Phase 4 on the page is litigation only if the project decides it is necessary.