Carroll County Sheriff Expresses Opposition To MPRP

But he says he will continue to enforce the law, and keep the peace in Carroll County.Carroll County Sheriff Jim DeweesFrederick, Md (KM) There’s strong opposition in the region to the proposed Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project, and one of those opposed is Carroll County Sheriff Jim Dewees.MPRP is a proposed 500-kilovolt electric transmission line which will travel  through northern Baltimore County, central Carroll County and southern Frederick County, ending at the Doubs substation in Adamstown.”And the Piedmont Reliability Group: their messaging was horrible,” Sheriff Dewees said. “One of the first things they came out and said was eminent domain. If you don’t like it,  we’re going to take it. I’m not a fan of it at all. I’m doing everything I can to stop it.”But Sheriff Dewees says he will continue to enforce the law in Carroll County, and keep the peace. “Understand, that I won’t allow any civil unrest or any crime to take place while they’re navigating. Certainly, I’m going to protect—regardless of whether it’s the Piedmont Group or the landowners themselves–but I’m pushing this through the courts with everybody else to try and influence it so that it stops this project in its tracks.”Dewees was a guest recently on WFMD’s “Morning News Express.”Representatives from Public Service Enterprise Group, a New Jersey utility charged with building the line, say they need to enter the affected properties to do environmental surveys as part of the approval process for MPRP. But they say the property owners have refused to let them on their lands, and have even threatened them with violence. The property owners deny that.Sheriff Dewees says land owners have a right to deny PSEG representatives from entering their properties. “The Stop MPRP group has been able to advise the landowners on how to approach the surveyors. I certainly don’t want surveyors to be assaulted, harmed or anything like that. And they will notify you they’re coming on to your property. And you have a right to say ‘you’re coming on to my property.’ And then they’ve got to take that to the courts,” he saysIf this project is approved by the Maryland Public Service Commission and is eventually constructed, Dewees say it’s won’t be around very long. “They can get their eminent domain and they can throw up these towers. I promise you five, ten years down the road, those towers are going to be obsolete. They’re going to waste everybody’s time because there’s going to be another energy source in order to get energy to those data centers. They’re going to plow through some really nice properties,” Sheriff Dewees says.The electricity traveling through these transmission lines is expected to power data centers in northern Virginia.By Kevin McManus