RMs opposed to Bipole III

Four Manitoba rural municipalities are asking for help from their fellow RMsto lobby the provincein opposition tothe placement of an electrical transmission line.

The Association of Manitoba Municipalities will vote next week on whether it will try to help the RMs keep Manitoba Hydro's controversial Bipole III project away from agricultural land.

In 2007, the NDP government announced the $2 billion project would be built on the west side of Lake Winnipeg to preserve a boreal forest on the east side. In doing so, it overruled Hydro's original plans.

'It really doesn't make any sense to any of us at all.' RM of Grey Reeve Ted Tkachyk

But that decision meant the power line would cost an extra $640 million because it would have to be longer than if it was constructed on the east side of the lake. The western route is 50 per cent longer.

RM of Grey Reeve Ted Tkachyk said hundreds of people have turned up to local meetings with Hydro to discuss the route of the line, but said the Crown utility hasn't explained why its building through valuable farmland when going down the east side of Lake Winnipeg would have far less impact.

"It's really baffling to us what is going on why they decided that it had to go to the west side. It really doesn't make any sense to any of us at all," Tkachyk said.

The province has said the preferred route avoids National and Provincial Parks, as well as First Nation reserve lands, and has the least impact on agricultural land.

An estimated 37 acres of agricultural land will be taken out of service along the entire route, which has a 66-metre right-of-way.

The Manitoba branch of the Wilderness Committee is pleased with the proposed path but Tkachykis worried Bipole III will devalue the rest of the farm properties that itpasses through or near.

"Therefore the municipalities will collect less taxes on those pieces of land forever, and that's a very important item to the municipalities and to the landowner because it does devalue their property," Tkachyk said.

However, he admits he's not sure lobbying efforts by the AMM can result in the change the RMs are seeking.

"I'm not very optimistic that it can be done but that doesn't mean that I'm going to quit," Tkachyk said.