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Mid Hudson Times, Wednesday, March 30, 2016
Pilgrim seeks easements for oil pipeline
New Windsor resident won’t sign contract
By SHANTAL RILEY
[email protected]
A
s environmentalists continue efforts to oppose the
Pilgrim Pipeline - a double pipeline slated to transport oil products along a 178-mile route through
New York and New Jersey - pipeline agents are knocking
on doors of Hudson Valley residents offering money for
rights to their property.
Chris Maciel says she is concerned an easement would
negatively affect her property value. “They came to us
with a contract for an easement,” said Maciel. “We didn’t
sign it.”
Maciel lives in New Windsor, on property adjacent to
the New York State Thruway, along which developers
intend to lay the majority of the pipeline. If approved,
the pipeline would carry crude oil and refined petroleum
products between Albany and Linden, N.J.
Knocking on doors
Maciel slowly walked the boundaries of her property on a sunny, Saturday afternoon. Tiny green shoots
pushed up through patches of purple hyacinths and
bright yellow daffodils in her budding garden. “I love
every bit of this property,” she said.
Maciel pointed to a heavily-wooded area to the rear of
the property. The land butts directly up against the west
side of the Thruway.
Maciel and her husband, both retired, have owned the
property for 35 years. Pipeline reps first came to visit a
couple of years ago. “They said the pipeline project was
going to Albany,” said Maciel. “They wanted to know if we
were willing to talk more. We said yes. We had no idea.”
They returned in January with a contract to sign,
granting Pilgrim Pipeline Holdings an easement for a
100-by-150-foot area of property closest to the Thruway.
“They said they wanted to install a valve,” Maciel
explained. “The valve would connect to the pipeline.”
The company offered $11,000 for the easement. But,
due to their concern for possible property devaluation
and contamination of their well water, they didn’t sign
the contract.
Agents returned the next month, this time offering the
couple $16,000. “When we refused to sign it, they said,
‘You know, this may have to be decided by a court and
there is eminent domain,’ said Maciel.
They left the contract with them. But, Maciel says, she
has made up her mind not to sign it. “It’s not worth the
threat to environment and the devaluing of our property,” she said. “The easement would be forever. They
would be able to come in any time and make any kind of
changes they want.”
Since the visit in January, Maciel has done some
research and found out about the laterals that are planned
to extend through local watersheds. “If something goes
wrong, the oil would leak into the ground and it could get
into the water,” she said.
Maciel, whose property sits directly across from the
Riley Road Water Filtration Plant, says the company has
Chris Maciel stands on her 5-acre property on Riley Road.
also contacted her neighbors to get them to sign contracts. “I just don’t trust those oil people,” she admitted.
Following both the Town and City of Newburgh, the
Town of New Windsor passed a resolution opposing the
pipeline in December. To date, more than 50 municipalities have passed resolutions opposing the pipeline in New
York and New Jersey.
The City of Newburgh
“The pipeline travels right through the watershed for
the City of Newburgh,” said Peter Smith of the Quassaick
Creek Watershed Alliance.
Smith was a speaker at a forum on the Pilgrim Pipeline,
sponsored by the Newburgh Conservation Advisory
Council in partnership with Orange Residents Against
Pilgrim Pipeline (RAPP). The event was held at the
Newburgh Free Library last week.
The City of Newburgh watershed is made up of three
main areas, said Smith, gesturing to a map depicting
Washington Lake, Brown’s Pond and Patton Brook.
He pointed to a lateral proposed to cut east through
New Windsor and the City of Newburgh, heading toward
the Hudson River and the Global Companies fuel storage
site. Another lateral is planned to cut t