Mountain Valley Pipeline drops plan for blanket permit
ROANOKE — Mountain Valley Pipeline says it will abandon its plan to use a blanket permit to cross nearly 500 streams and wetlands.
The Roanoke Times reported Tuesday that the pipeline project will instead apply for individual approvals for each open-cut crossing.
That will make for a more costly and time-consuming process for a project that is already swamped by legal and regulatory delays, but Mountain Valley attorney Todd Normane said in a letter Tuesday to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that switching to individual permits is “the most efficient and effective path to project completion.”
The federal 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has twice set aside the blanket permit. Critics have said that it fails to adequately assess the environmental impacts of a massive pipeline fording pristine mountain streams.
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The project has faced various legal challenges from environmental groups because construction has led to violations of regulations meant to control erosion and sedimentation.
Mountain Valley said it still expects to complete the project by year’s end at a projected cost of about $6 billion. That’s nearly twice the original estimate.
The 303-mile pipeline will take natural gas drilled from the Marcellus and Utica shale formations and move it through West Virginia and Virginia.
UVA adds five in family to enslaved workers’ memorial
CHARLOTTESVILLE — The names of five family members have been added to a memorial to enslaved workers at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
The Daily Progress reports that the names were officially added at a private dedication on Jan. 19.
The University of Virginia’s Memorial to Enslaved Laborers acknowledges and honors an estimated 4,000 people who built and worked at the university. It was designed by Thomas Jefferson, the nation’s third president.
The names that were added were Davy Hern, Fanny Gillette Hern, Bonnycastle Hern, Lily Hern and Ben Snowden. The name of a sixth family member, Thirmston Hern, was already part of the memorial.
All six were related to an enslaved family at Monticello and to Charlottesville native Myra Anderson. “I grew up in Charlottesville — all of my life and in school we never heard about slavery at UVA,” Anderson said.
Va. officials reviewing new names for Camp Pendleton
VIRGINIA BEACH — Virginia officials are reviewing new names for a military reservation that currently honors a Confederate chief of artillery.
Several alternatives for Camp Pendleton in Virginia Beach are being considered by a working group from the state’s veterans affairs and defense agencies and the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Gov. Ralph Northam’s office said. The group will submit a recommendation by the end of February.
The 325-acre state military reservation was set up as a rifle range for the state’s National Guard in 1912. It was used by the Army in World War II and formally named after William Nelson Pendleton, who served as chief of artillery for Gen. Joseph Johnston and later acted in the same role for the entire Confederate Army.
The 2021 National Defense Authorization Act approved by Congress in December includes a call to replace Confederate names of federal military bases. In Virginia, those also include Fort Lee, Fort Pickett and Fort A.P. Hill.
Alena Yarmosky, a spokeswoman for Northam, said Camp Pendleton was the only installation under the state’s purview.