Busy day at work today. But we’ve been thinking (brooding) a lot about how to write about the long telephone conversation we had yesterday with Enbridge Vice President Mark Sitek. We think we’ve figured out a strategy that we will be helpful, fair, appropriately detailed (cuz we know you want the goods), and revealing.
That means, of course, a new series! So early tomorrow (we hope):
Part I: Insularity and Perspective
Earlier this afternoon, we had a long telephone conversation with Mark Sitek–yes, that Mark Sitek, Enbridge’s Vice President of Major Projects Execution. We spoke for about an hour. On the whole we thought the exchange was amicable and productively candid on both sides. Perhaps this will set the tone for the upcoming encounters with Enbridge folks we’re bound to have at the Public Safety Trust conference in a couple of weeks.
We’re working up an account of our conversation and will post it as soon as we can. In the meantime, we’ll just say that we hope that our conversation will bear some fruit. Until we learn otherwise, we’re giving Mr. Sitek the benefit of the doubt and assuming that he didn’t call just to appease us, but to gather information that will lead to action, some genuine and positive measures that will help improve or repair Enbridge’s relations with landowners.
We are grateful to Mr. Sitek for his time. (Unfortunately, we must also report that we have still not heard from Lands and Right-of-Way Project Manager Doug Aller. Nor have we received any replies form spokespersons Jennifer Smith and Lorraine Little, whom we contacted about some troubling Enbridge remarks in an Indiana newspaper last week.)
This week in the Brandon Citizen, Susan Bromley (our favorite small-town reporter) has a q & a with Enbridge’s Jason Manshum. The interview focuses primarily on the status of construction in Brandon Township, which has evidently ceased for the time being as the parties attempt to resolve the question of Enbridge’s compliance with Brandon’s Woodlands ordinance. (more…)
One of the favored stock utterances of Enbridge representatives, one we’ve heard countless times over the past few months, is “we want to be a good neighbor.” Project Manager Tom Hodge said this repeatedly to the Brandon Township trustees at their “workshop” last month–as his fellow Enbridge reps, including three spokespersons and attorney Michael Ashton, all nodded their heads in agreement. And while on the whole, we found Hodge more credible than most of the Enbridge representatives we’ve encountered, we were skeptical of that hollow phrase. Indeed, given the chance to comment at the end of the meeting, we said as much, pointing out that Enbridge didn’t come to that meeting in a spirit of cooperation; they only agreed to the meeting reluctantly and were there only to placate, not to comply or even compromise. That doesn’t strike us as all that neighborly. (more…)
In a post this morning we linked to another fine report by David Hasemyer at Inside Climate News. The crack team of journalists over there has been doing terrific– and invaluable– work on Enbridge and related matters for months. At the end of our post, we repeated something we’ve said often here and that we’ve heard plenty of others say as well: it didn’t have to be this way. Had Enbridge treated landowners fairly and respectfully, truthfully and consistently, with honesty and dignity they would not be facing the sort of opposition they’re facing now, a level of citizen resistance that Carl Weimer, Executive Director of the Pipeline Safety Trust, calls “extraordinary.” Speaking personally, had Enbridge dealt honestly, fairly, and respectfully with us, there would be no Line 6B Citizens’ Blog nor any of the activity that has gone along with it. If, in fact, we’ve become “activists,” we are activists of Enbridge’s own making.
All of which raises a question that continually gnaws at us: why? Why does Enbridge repeatedly act in ways that alienate stakeholders? Why behave so antagonistically? So disingenuously? So litigiously? Why try to cut corners and try to get away with things? After all, everybody knows that Enbridge is ultimately going to get their replacement pipeline; that’s never been in question. But why not just do it right and save everybody the grief, the aggravation, and (in Ken Weathers’ phrase) “the personal anxiety they have been causing people”? (more…)
We thought we were done with our series on Enbridge spokesman Larry Springer’s outrageous statement a couple of weeks back. You remember: Springer insisted that Enbridge’s actions show that they deal openly and honestly with stakeholders, despite what those pesky “special interest groups” and their compatriots in the media who just want to stir up controversy would have you believe.
We took exception with that statement (again and again). We think we made our point quite clearly (and factually). We were prepared to give it a rest for a while.
But then examples of not-so-open and not-so-honest dealings by Enbridge just keep coming. Here’s a recent one: (more…)
An important blog entry from the always razor-sharp Anthony Swift at the National Resources Defense Council. Swift calls our attention to more essential investigative work at Inside Climate News, this time by Lisa Song (whose work we’ve praised before). From Swift:
Enbridge’s Kalamazoo tar sands spill presents another case undercutting industry’s claims about pipeline safety and leak detection. As the InsideClimate piece notes, “Just 10 days before the accident, Enbridge Inc., which operates the Michigan pipeline, told federal regulators it could remotely detect and shut down a rupture in eight minutes. But when the line burst open, it took Enbridge 17 hours to confirm the spill.”
Our interrogation of Enbridge spokesman Larry Springer’s astonishing statement to journalist David Hasemyer last week keeps getting interrupted: first by the recent Brandon Township “workshop” with Enbridge and then today by some good news from the Oakland County Circuit Court. If you missed the first two parts of our discussion of Hasemyer’s excellent article and Springer’s statement, you can read them here (and here). This morning, we return to that series.
First, let’s revisit what Springer actually said about people like us (and perhaps you), ordinary citizens who have reasonable and perfectly understandable concerns about the Line 6B project:
“While there has been recent publicity and activity by special interest groups, most who live and work along the pipeline are not opposed to Enbridge’s plans to replace Line 6B,” he said. “While the media may choose to focus on controversial situations, Enbridge’s actions show that we deal openly and honestly with all stakeholders, including landowners and local governments.”
I have to confess: part of me still can’t believe he said this. But he did. Today, we will explore the last part of his statement. And we’ll do it simply. We’ll just gather together some actual examples of actual Enbridge actions and see whether those actions do, in fact, show that Enbridge “deal[s] openly and honestly with all stakeholders.” (more…)
The Straw Man Tactic
We’ve grown accustomed to hollow phrases, evasions, and clever mystifications from Enbridge spokesmen. But, as we have already noted, what Larry Springer offers up in his statement to David Hasemyer is a series of untruths. Once again, here is Springer:
“While there has been recent publicity and activity by special interest groups, most who live and work along the pipeline are not opposed to Enbridge’s plans to replace Line 6B,” he said. “While the media may choose to focus on controversial situations, Enbridge’s actions show that we deal openly and honestly with all stakeholders, including landowners and local governments.”
Let me first put this in some context. (more…)
There are plenty of things in David Hasemyer’s excellent article this morning in Inside Climate News that have got our motor running. So much that we’ll likely be writing about it for some time. But of everything Hasemyer reports, what turned our low simmer to a rolling boil are the remarks of Enbridge spokesman Larry Springer. In fact, they are so egregious, it’s going to take us more than one post to deal with just one statement. Here we’ll provide a summary of our objections, which we’ll follow-up with a number of posts that elaborate on each point.
So here is the statement:
“While there has been recent publicity and activity by special interest groups, most who live and work along the pipeline are not opposed to Enbridge’s plans to replace Line 6B,” he said. “While the media may choose to focus on controversial situations, Enbridge’s actions show that we deal openly and honestly with all stakeholders, including landowners and local governments.”
Let us count the ways Larry Springer is demonstrably wrong: (more…)