Panelists say TVA plan would hurt environment

Panelists say TVA plan would hurt environment

By AMY FRENCH
Times Staff Writer

The Tennessee Valley Authority is "on a power trip," angry environmentalists charged Saturday during a "Rally the Valley" forum here against TVA chairman Craven Crowell's move to abandon non-power programs.

Though initially scheduled to attend the forum, TVA officials begged off two days before and were unavailable to respond to complaints of those in attendance. About 40 people attended the forum at the Huntsville-Madison County public library on Monroe Street.

In a letter of regret read at the meeting, Ruben Hernandez, TVA's head of land management, said, "We are currently

rently designing a process for effective stakeholder involvement in addressing this issue. It is simply not possible for staff members . . . to attend every meeting that is called."

Forum organizer Lynn Leach of the Alabama Environmental Council interpreted the cancellation as a refusal by TVA to face the public to discuss a controversial decision made behind closed doors.

Several more forums are to be held in the seven-state area TVA serves, with the next scheduled for April 21 at a Florence location to be announced.

TVA held 16 public meetings and took written opinions on its proposed non-power abandonment during a public comment period that ended Oct. 15, but those measures did not allow for open discussion, Leach said. Comments, she said, were submitted for review by a committee with no members independent of the authority.

"They are afraid if they don't control the process, they might have to really listen to the public sentiment and explain themselves honestly," Leach said.

What TVA needs to explain, according to forum panelists, is a decision they say violates its New Deal authorizing legislation. The panelists also contended the proposal would ultimately raise taxes and utility costs to residential customers, as well as hurt the environment because TVA would no longer take care of waterways altered by its dam and nuclear power plant construction.

Power generation initially was a secondary priority to other efforts for which TVA was created — such as flood control, navigation improvement and wetlands preservation — said Steve Smith of the Tennessee Valley Energy Reform Coalition in Knoxville.

"TVA was not meant to be the world's largest power generator," but that is what it is headed toward becoming — "the valley be damned," Smith said.

Smith speculated that Crowell's decision to abandon non-power programs was motivated by the profit potential of imminent utilities deregulation. As TVA and other utilities near a time of price wars in the Tennessee Valley and other markets, he said, they don't want to balance profiteering with conservation efforts.

Cities, such as Huntsville, that are locked into service agreements with TVA for at least 10 years will see the negative effects on the environment, but won't get lower utility prices by shopping for utilities, Smith said.

"Folks, I'm telling you, these guys are on a power trip — in more ways than one."

Passing responsibility for non-power services from TVA to other agencies isn't feasible, said Bruce Houck, an environmentalist and director of vector control for the city of Huntsville.

TVA's team of biologists, botanists and other conservation-minded scientist has done a relatively good job of fulfilling the authority's environmental responsibilities, Houck said.

But, he said, fragmenting those responsibilities to other, unqualified, uncoordinated federal, state and local agencies would spell disaster. "I'm in government — and I know that the more you can divide something up into different sectors, the quicker you can get rid of it."

Ken Wills, a biologist with Alabama's Environmental Council, added that North Alabama is home to several rare and beautiful, but fragile, ecosystems with its spring-fed wetlands, caves and old-growth forests of cypress and oak. Also, he said, it is a stopping place for migrating songbirds and hummingbirds that contribute to the area's aesthetics and ecology.

"Hunters and fishermen, tree-huggers and Bubbas, we're all on the same side of this issue," said Leach, who urged her audience to sign petitions and write letters to government officials requesting:

• A moratorium on the transfer of public lands out of TVA's responsibility, as well as a moratorium on the termination of activities, projects and employees related to these holdings.
• Call for a regional commission with representatives from state, federal and local agencies, as well as recreation, watershed management, conservation, tourism and economic interests.
• Call for maintenance of the Tennessee Valley watershed as a whole, not as a piecemeal effort distributed among various agencies.

For more information, call the Tennessee Valley Energy Reform Commission toll-free at 1-888-2FIXTVA (1-888-234-9882) or visit its Web site at www.korrnet.org/tverc.