We talk a lot about being good neighbors in Iowa.
That term comes under fire when it comes to the Navigator Heartland pipeline.
Throughout the meeting with the Iowa Utilities Board, speaker Elizabeth Burns-Thompson noted Navigator had publicized their projects at newspapers in counties who will be impacted by the project.
But notice of the Navigator Heartland project was never made to the Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun newspaper. There was no publication of maps, even though the path clearly has this pipe going by this community to the south and west.
No communication or heads-up was given to the City of Mount Vernon ahead of this proposed pipeline, as revealed at this past month’s city council meetings. There was no communication to the Mount Vernon school district, Lisbon-Mount Vernon Ambulance Service or Mount Vernon-Lisbon Police Department.
The only communication started with landowners whose land was to potentially house this pipeline on their ground. Those landowners led the communication to the rest of the community, because they’re good neighbors.
If publishing in the largest newspaper in a county is all that is required for these hazardous pipelines, that is something that needs to be changed by the Iowa Utilities Board, especially if more of these pipelines are going to be built in the future. Yes, these might not be popular, and it might anger people to know they’re going to be next door. But at least citizens know what’s happening in their backyards.
The good faith effort of communication should extend to the cities and communities who are going to be impacted by a pipeline so close to their homes.
Being a good neighbor on a proposed $3 billion project isn’t just publishing in a single newspaper per county. It’s locating newspapers along a pipeline’s proposed route that have significant populations and reaching out to notify them of the project as well. It’s communicating, even in planning stages, that there is a potential hazardous pipeline coming. It’s letting communities know of the dangers in proximities to their borders to give them a chance to better prepare when they do become a reality.
Navigator and the Iowa Utilities Board need to do better in the future.