The ET Rover news in the last week or so has not been good. First, Lapeer prosecutors performed some very shoddy legal research which led them to issue a misinformed, Rover-friendly memo regarding Rover’s right to survey. Our guess is that some crafty ET Rover lawyer whispered some sweet legal nothings in the prosecutor’s ear, seducing him into adopting Rover’s (mistaken, we believe) view of the law.

Meanwhile, some ET Rover executives had a sit down this week with some local officials and state representatives. At a meeting at the Groveland Township offices (that’s our township), ET Rover officials met with a half dozen township supervisors, State Senator Dave Robertson, and State Representative Joseph Graves. According to Groveland Supervisor Bob DePalma, ET refused to hold a public meeting. Frankly, that’s unsurprising: refusing to communicate openly with the public is typical of the industry (because they’re both secretive and cowardly). Enbridge did the same thing.

It’s hard to get too worked up about ET Rover’s tactic, which, while reprehensible, is totally predictable. What’s more infuriating about this is the fact that the township supervisors agreed to play by ET Rover’s rules instead of calling their bluff. The supervisors could have (and should have!) just refused to have a closed door meeting, then informed FERC and the press about Rover’s unwillingness to deal openly with Michiganders. We’re reasonably confident Rover would have caved, just like Enbridge did.

The same goes for Lapeer County Commissioners, who also gave in to Rover’s stealth approach and participated in a similar closed door meeting. But that meeting appears mainly have to confused matters, rather than providing any clarity (more on this soon).

In better news, Rep. Graves has organized a Town Hall meeting for this coming week, Oct. 15 at Holly High School from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Evidently, Rover has not accepted Graves’s invitation to participate– because, as we said above, they are cowardly. A Town Hall is a great idea and we’re glad it’s happening, even though we have a conflict and can’t attend. On the other hand, we’re more than a little worried about what kinds of information will be presented at the meeting. It’s not clear who is going to be in charge of this town hall and how knowledgeable those persons are.

For example, we understand that Graves has invited a representative from the Michigan Public Service Commission “to give a broad outline of property owners’ rights.” Honestly, we find that prospect terrifying, for several reasons. First, the MPSC has no role to play whatsoever in regulating interstate natural gas pipelines, so they’re an odd choice to participate in this town hall to begin with. Secondly, even in those areas where the MPSC does have a role, they really don’t have much to do with property rights (although we think they should). Lastly, even worse is that we can tell you from experience that the MPSC is no champion of property rights; frankly, they seem to us rather indifferent to them (see our full series on how the MPSC failed Line 6B landowners). So while someone from the MPSC might be able to provide some general remarks about eminent domain– the sort of thing you can get from, say, the Pipeline Safety Trust or FERC’s Citizens’s Guide, they certainly are not going to be equipped to speak about the realities and complexities of negotiating easements and preparing for a pipeline construction project on your land. Put simply, an MPSC rep is a bad choice for this very important task.

We’re going to write to Rep. Graves today to share our worries about the meeting. And we’re encouraging some people we know who really are informed to attend. Hopefully, this will help counteract or clear up any incomplete or bad information.

Unfortunately, that little problem only points to an even bigger one, which involves the way (mis)information about projects like this is parceled out by various parties, some of whom may not be trustworthy (the pipeline companies), some of whom are a bit too inclined to believe those who aren’t trustworthy (state representatives and regulators), and some of whom may not be sure what to believe or may not understand these complicated processes (local officials, ordinary citizens). This is a serious problem, one that, if news accounts are accurate, is illustrated vividly by last week’s closed door meetings.  The remarks by some of the officials who attended those meetings seem to indicate that at least some of those officials are either confused or credulous. Either way, that’s not going to allow them to inform vulnerable landowners and concerned citizens very helpfully.

We’ll discuss specific examples of this confusion and credulity in a follow-up post. In it, we’ll try to bring a little more clarity and accuracy to some not-so-clear and not-so-accurate statements we’ve seen in newspaper accounts about those exclusive meetings between Rover reps and local officials. Please stay tuned.