One action Douglas County has taken is denying access to county forest land for right-of-way work the utilities need to do along the route approved for the 345,000 volt transmission line.  Finn says that Minnesota Power and Wisconsin Public Service (the two utilities seeking to build the line) have instead been trying to move the contested portion of the route onto private land and have been seeking permission from private landowners for the alternate route.

Even if the private landowners agree to the route, Finn is convinced that the state Public Service Commission would have to approve the change.  "Absolutely," he says.  "They would have to go back to the PSC."

Douglas County declared its opposition to the transmission line more than three years ago.  Finn, who lives in Superior,  mentions that citizens came to the county board concerned with health impacts from the line, land crossing issues, and a perspective that the line was not going to benefit Douglas County.

At the other end of the route, the Marathon County Board has denied the utilities access to the Nine Mile County Forest for survey work and soil borings.  The work is again needed along the right-of-way for the transmission line.  The May 21 action was approved by a 19 to 12 vote of the county supervisors.
SOUL's president Tom Kreager called the move "a major setback for WPS."  The supervisors who opposed the route work  "are heroes to the residents of Marathon County," Kraeger added.

Across the northern part of the state, nearly 100 local governments passed resolutions opposing the Duluth-to-Wausau electric transmission line before the application to build it was even filed with the state PSC.  Any traveler across the region will note the frequent appearance of large "No Line" signs that sprinkle the area's roadsides and indicate the widespread public opposition to the project.

Frustrated utility officials have begun suing property owners in Marathon County who have denied them access to their land for right-of-way work.  One report indicates that at least 70 landowners have had papers filed against them in Marathon County.  Utility officials indicate that they will condemn land if they need to.

Logan Edinger, another SOUL member and the Wisconsin Stewardship Network's contact on the transmission line issue, says that the utilities cannot begin their line work until they receive all of their permits from other permitting authorities, such as the state DNR.  Edinger says the PSC's decision approving the line made this point clear.

Still lacking all their permits, Edinger indicates that the utilities are trying "to force their way into people's properties and to destroy the rights of the landowners."

SOUL members also remain disturbed by the Public Service Commission process used in reaching their decision supporting  construction of the transmission line.  After the decision was made by the agency's three commissioners, an anonymous PSC staffer sent SOUL a CD containing data indicating that the process was manipulated so that the commissioners could approve the line inspite of the evidence presented during the lengthy public hearings.

"This person [who sent the CD] is trying to tell us that they came up with the wrong conclusion," says Linda Ceylor, a dairy farmer and member of SOUL.  The CD contains records and milestones used for the decision.  Ceylor says several key points were curiously omitted in the final documents used by the commissioners for their decision.  One such point is the assumption that no new power plants would be built in eastern Wisconsin, the part of the state for which the line is supposed to provide power.  But a number of plants have been built and/or approved for the region to bolster electric reliability and capacity.

SOUL hopes they will be able to clarify the matter during their court appeal of the PSC decision and perhaps demonstrate the pro-utility bias displayed by the agency's three commissioners, who are appointed by the Governor.