Residents want more info on power project

Jillian and Calvin Farwell stand in their Dummerston woods Monday. (Jason R. Henske/Reformer)

DUMMERSTON -- To watch Calvin and Jillian Farwell trek through the backwoods of their 140 acres is to see two people whose lives are intimately connected with their land.

Jillian, a Brattleboro-based artist, has spent much of her life on the West Dummerston property that has been in her family for more than 90 years. Calvin, a science teacher at Leland & Gray Union High School in Townshend, spends nearly every afternoon walking and maintaining the property's woodland trails.

As they hike along a steep ravine in the northwestern corner of their property, the two can hardly make it 10 feet without their attention being distracted by a swooping barn owl, the song of a thrush or an errant turkey feather.

So it comes as no surprise, perhaps, that a proposed electrical transmission line that could cut their property in half does not

"This land has been sort of guarded over for almost a century by my family," Jillian Farwell said Monday afternoon, sitting on the trunk of a felled tree at the edge of the ravine. "I would feel just terrible about not protecting its wilderness."

An extensive package of transmission line and power station upgrades in Windham and Windsor counties, known as the Southern Loop project, would affect not only the Farwells, but scores of other landowners and towns along a 51-mile corridor.

The extent of the estimated $200 million project proposed by Vermont Electric Power Co. and Central Vermont Public Service Corp. has only recently become known to many landowners and towns along its path. Having declared a 45-day notice to relevant parties, the two utility companies plan to officially file for a "certificate of public good" from the Vermont Public Service Board on July 25.

From there, the stage will be set for a prolonged process of review and debate that could span years. According to VELCO spokesman Kerrick Johnson, the project could be completed no sooner than late 2010.

But officials in Dummerston -- one of the most heavily affected of the 13 towns through which the lines would pass -- are already concerned they do not have enough time to adequately respond to the proposal before the first deadline on July 18.

"We don't really know what we're dealing with or even who we're dealing with. We just don't know anything," said Dummerston planning commission chairman Stephan Mindel. "The position we're in right now is we're just sitting here dumb-struck by the magnitude of this project. We just don't seem to know anything."

And the Farwells -- whose plans to take their property off the electrical grid and to help one of their four children move back home from Chicago with his family have been put on hold -- don't know what to do.

"I can't see how anybody could live on this land," Jillian Farwell said. "I wouldn't want to live here at all. I can't imagine living here with that here."

The Southern Loop project consists of multiple complicated and interconnected parts. But its greatest single component is the widening of an existing 51-mile, 345-kilovolt line that extends from just north of Entergy Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon to the Coolidge substation in Cavendish.

VELCO has owned a 250-foot right-of-way along the corridor --which winds from Vernon through Guilford, Brattleboro, Dummerston, Newfane, Brookline, Townshend, Grafton, Windham, Andover, Chester and Ludlow to its end point in Cavendish -- since the 1960s. An existing high-tension line would essentially be doubled along all 51 miles, and up to 100 feet of trees could be cleared along the path to make room for the new line.

The Coolidge Connector, as the 51-mile portion is called, would necessitate additional infrastructure, including an expanded substation in West Dummerston and a new substation in Vernon, north of Vermont Yankee.

The West Dummerston substation, which sits just south of the West River oxbow near the remains of an ancient dam, would be linked to the Coolidge Connector with a brand new, three-quarter mile line called the Dummerston Loop.

That's where the Farwells come in.

From 1920 until 1948, Jillian Farwell's great aunt ran Camp Arden, a girls' summer theater program, on the property that now bears its name. Since then the 140 acres of woods, meadows and old buildings have been used for a variety of educational purposes -- including the Peace Corps' first training program, which was run by the School for International Training.

The Farwells raised their children on the land along with two other families -- working the land in a communal fashion. Until recently, their 37-year-old son, Sam, planned to follow his parents' footsteps and move with his family from Chicago back to the Camp Arden property.

"I don't know what he's going to do now," Jillian said. "Lucky he wasn't six months into building."

Several weeks ago, Jillian received a visit from Ray Jewett, a consultant hired by VELCO to explain the regulatory process to landowners and to seek permission to survey the land in question.

The two spent hours discussing the project and Jillian eventually signed an agreement to allow VELCO to further explore the Camp Arden property.

"As soon as he left, I wondered if by signing this I signed something more than I thought it was," she said. "When I saw the map, I thought, 'this is another dimension I didn't even imagine.'"

The Dummerston Loop, according to Johnson, touches on property owned by six landowners, though the Farwells own the largest section. The new, 250-foot-wide corridor would accommodate two pairs of lines and would necessitate a small-scale deforestation of the area.

The Farwells have come out against the extension, they say, not just because it runs through their backyard, but because they feel the expansion of the grid is a step in the wrong direction.

"I think it's stupid to expand the grid," Calvin Farwell said. "This plan is a beautiful plan by 1950s standards, but it's not a beautiful plan by 2007 standards. We need to use the electricity we have."

But according to Johnson, the fact is that Vermont's electrical grid -- and New England's as a whole -- is under increasing strain and could be in danger of large-scale power failures in the immediate future.

"The capacity of the line to carry more energy has just about been maxed out," he said.

The problem is both local and regional. While the Coolidge Connector funnels electricity from southern New England to markets in northern Vermont, as well as surrounding states, the Dummerston Loop and the West Dummerston substation would principally solve local power issues in the Windham County area.

"Most, if not all, of our electricity transmission eggs are in that one basket," Johnson said of the Coolidge Connector. "If something isn't done to create another basket, you're much more open to significant outages."

But Jillian Farwell says the questions that have been asked and answered by the power utilities are too small.

"My concern is deeper than that. It's about the wild earth," she said. "I feel like the conversation should be bigger."

Since the Farwells received notice of the project, they have attempted to enlist the support of neighbors and town leaders -- sending a letter to fellow residents of the Hague community and encouraging them to attend a planning commission meeting held Tuesday evening.

The commission has until July 18 to weigh in on the project before the utilities file official notice with the Public Service Board -- the quasi-judicial body that will eventually decide whether the project goes forward. They can later request to become an official party in the matter and request that a future public hearing take place in Dummerston.

Following a two-hour meeting, during which the Farwells and several neighbors expressed reservations about the plan, the commission issued a statement saying that information about the project, "has been inadequate and the public process non-inclusive. The affected landowners have basically been notified at the last minute. The town as received minimal notice."

VELCO and CVPS representatives dispute the claim that the public has not been involved. On the contrary, they say, two years of public meetings with stakeholders in the process led to the current design.

"We've been really interested in hearing local concerns and ideas, and that will continue as we go forward," said CVPS spokesman Steve Costello. "I think we made a strong, sincere and, frankly, unprecedented effort to get as much public input as possible."

The Farwells wonder, however, why nobody told them about the plan until weeks ago.

As they bushwhacked their way from the edge of the ravine through a section of woods that could eventually be replaced by power lines, the Farwells said they worry their land could eventually be taken from them by eminent domain.

"That feels scary," Jillian Farwell said. "That feels like a pressure that is not okay. That is something I'm scared about."

Moreover, she said, the process feels to her like a shift from a participatory grassroots system to a top-down imposition from the energy industry.

"It's undermining the independence people really need for taking responsibility for their own lives," she said.

Next in the series: A look at growing pressures on the regional grid and the hurdles that stand between the Southern Loop proposal and its approval.

Paul Heintz can be reached at pheintz@reformer.com or 802-254-2311, ext. 275.