165. How Hill Country Landowners Are Challenging CPS Energy's 370-Mile Transmission Line Plan

Bob Rivard: [00:00:00] Our guests today are Ted Flato, one of the two founding principles of Lake Flato Architects, a nationally recognized architecture firm. Located right here in San Antonio and Jada Jo Smith, the owner of Orange Blossom Realty in Utopia, Texas. Both individuals are longtime ranchers in the Texas Hill country and the Edwards Plateau and stewards of that environment who have worked for years to protect the region's, rivers, creeks, and springs, including the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone, which runs underground through multiple Edwards Plateau Counties, and both are helping lead the opposition to the proposed routes for the Howard Solstice transmission line, which would bring energy from San Antonio and CPS Energy.

To West Texas in the Permian basis, to the Permian basis, and in all likelihood of some of the new data centers that are being planned for out in West Texas. That line would course 370 miles from Fort Stockton to Bear County,[00:01:00]

Ted and Jada. Jo, welcome to Big City, small Town. 

Jada Jo: Hi. 

Thanks for having us. 

Ted Flato: Thank you, Bob.

Bob Rivard: So, CPS energy in a EP Texas, they'd be the joint owners of this line, which would connect to Ercot statewide grid. Uh, the best current estimate is that the transmission line would cost about $1.4 billion in total to build. That includes construction, transmission structures, substations, and right of way land.

Acquisitions. That's part of the broader $33 billion Permian basin grid expansion plan by Ercot, so a EP Texas. For those in our audience that have never heard of that company owns and operates power lines, poles, and substations across large portions of south, central and West Texas. Within the Ercot grid, it delivers electricity to homes and businesses, but does not generate power or sell retail electricity plans.

So with that, let's get started. Um, what's going on with this transmission [00:02:00] line that got your attention and where do things stand today? 

Ted Flato: It really has gone very, very rapidly, um, this summer. Uh, CPS sent out notice to landowners, uh, that they were putting, uh, that they were planning a, this large transmission line that would go 200 or 370 miles from southwest San Antonio to Fort Stockton, taking electricity, uh, to the Permian Basin.

So electricity that's generated by CPS and then goes, uh, to Fort Stockton. And, um, and they, um. And it was, and it's all part of grid security, as you mentioned. And it's also under a really hurry up program. Normally something like this is a two or three year process, but in this case they're gonna do it in six months.

Uh, and, and, uh, so that was in, that was in in uh, July. That landowners like, uh, Jada, Jo. And I heard that they were planning these large transmission lines. And to give you a scale feel for the, these lines, these are larger than [00:03:00] any lines that have ever been in Texas. They are the height of the Statue of Liberty.

They're like 180 feet tall. They're uh, they need to have a 200 foot wide. Clear cut to put 'em in place. They're enormous. They dwarf anything we've ever seen and, and it's the clear cutting and it's the construction process that's huge. And one of the ways that they roll out these programs, and it's not, it's not unique to CPS or a EP, is that you.

You propose a myriad of lines that look like a spider web that goes through everyone's land. And in our case, they had lines crisscrossing all the way through the, the most cherished areas of the hill country. Uh, the Oasis, the Medina, the Saal. And because they put in so many lines and they don't say which route they care about, they just show a million lines 

Bob Rivard: options.

A 

Ted Flato: million options. So basically what it does is it pits [00:04:00] landowner against landowner. It's just, oh my gosh, I've gotta go get lawyers, I've gotta do this and that. And, uh, and that is what happened just overnight, uh, in July. And, uh, and then yeah, 

Jada Jo: we found out about open houses through, you know, they have to put up, um, a notice in the newspaper.

And, um, 

Bob Rivard: what do you mean open houses? Jada? 

Jada Jo: Uh, the utility companies were hosting what they called open houses. Okay. Which was to learn information on this project, on the project that they were proposing. Um, and to be in compliance, they just have to, to post a public notice. And so, like many landowners, we saw this.

Small little public noticed and thought, well, what's this go to? The open house that they had planned where they have maps and various information and you realize the magnitude and the scale of this project. 

Bob Rivard: Where was the open house and who conducted it? 

Jada Jo: Um, CPS and a EP conducted these open houses and they hosted three of 'em.

I believe the first one was in Jordan 10, one was in Uvalde, and then one was in Del Rio. 

Bob Rivard: Okay. 

Ted Flato: And historically, Bob, they would do [00:05:00] multiple open houses over. A year or so, but instead, because the schedule was so tight, they were only gonna do one. And what's interesting, so you get a notice in the mail that the, these big lines are maybe coming through your land and then you get a notice that in about a week, uh, show up in Jordan and hear about what it's, what it's all about.

And uh, and for the most part, because there's so many lines, there's not a preferred route. Um, just landowners are. Up against the other landowner. And uh, but this was a very unique situation because they were proposing so many of these lines running through the most cherished part of our hill country and the Devil's River basins that a lot of landowners looked at each other and said, well, we need to get together.

And so it was extremely unusual. But Jada, Jo. And a few others that happened to go to one of these early open houses said, well, wait a minute. Let's put together a petition. Let's just, let's get together. And so the [00:06:00] only probably silver lining in any of this is how many people were brought together in opposition to what was proposed.

The group was united around the, the concept of not running it through. The Edwards Aquifer recharge, the Edwards Aquifer Collection Basin, which is basically all the, where all the springs that we all know, the headwaters, the Oasis, the headwaters, the Freo. Um, that in opposition to running those lines through that area.

And then very unusually, we also, that coalition soon collected the whole group out in West Texas around the Devil's River about how critical it was that you not run it through the canyon lands of the Devil's River in the Pecos River. And so. Before we knew it, we had quite a large coalition saying we gotta do something about this.

And it all happened really literally in a month. Yeah. 

Bob Rivard: It's so quick. It's interesting that, um, there's been two such initiatives [00:07:00] happening in real time in our state, both of which are, uh, unusually bipartisan. Uh, in, in terms of their support, one is opposition to the $46 billion Trump wall through Big Bend National Park and State Park and the Big Bend area around those parks.

And now this one, uh, through the transmission, uh, of, you know, electricity from San Antonio all the way to the Permian Basin. And it just seems like they've united people. Beyond the partisan politics, which normally so bitterly divide us in this state. I, I want to hear from you, um, and Jada, Jo, you may be the best one to answer this.

What are, what are CPS energy officials telling people about why they have to go through these, um, the, the pristine environments that have never been damaged over time, uh, by human occupation or building and, and, um. And even what a San Antonio based utility is doing, trying to become such an important.

Energy provider, uh, to West Texas, [00:08:00] hundreds of miles away. 

Jada Jo: That's kind of the million dollar question, billion dollar question, right. Um, you know, I think they, they are in the business of trying to create this energy source. It's all backed by a legislative bill that was passed in 2023, house Bill 50 66, and I know Ted was mentioning this fast track.

Well, that bill particularly shortened the timeframe. And so I think when it came to. CPS and a EP both. They're not really taking responsibility for where the route goes at all. This is all something that has to be built. And so their, I feel like their perspective has been, we just need, we need to build this.

We need to provide this energy source and where it goes is going to be decided upon by the PUC, not us. We're just providing the resource. Um, so I feel like they've kind of taken a back seat in actually where this. Is going to be built. However, they have, you know, we did early on try [00:09:00] to, um, engage with CPS and just offer what we called our least harmful route, you know, from Hill Country Preservation Coalition's perspective.

There's no good route. There's no good place for these lines. Somebody, somebody's land is gonna be devastated. It's gonna cause harm to someone. Um, so when we say least harmful, we're not taking that lightly at all. But we did see that, you know, growth is coming. Infrastructure's needed for Texas, and the best way to do that is to stay along existing highway corridors.

So we took that to CPS from the beginning, asking them if they would consider some alternative links to their spiderweb map, like Ted said, offering additional routes that stayed closer along existing highway corridors. And when they rolled out their application in March, they. In some ways did adhere with their most regulatory compliant route, which is [00:10:00] Route four.

They did. Really consider, especially on the Eastern portion along Highway 90 or staying as close to Highway 90 as possible. They do have that option. It was more on the western end where they cut a little too close to the Devil's River and Pecos River that we'd like them to stay a little bit further north towards.

Um, I 10 

Bob Rivard: for anyone really that's driven I 10 West, um, people are very familiar. Uh, 10, 15 years ago, maybe a, maybe a little bit more. I'm not sure when the, uh. The, uh, energy transmission lines from West Texas to. To here were built right along the right of way. They're very large, uh, transmission poles with the line.

Very heavy duty lines. Something like we had never seen before. And farther north in the hill country, we saw, um, energy lines come through people's private property. Some people. You know, sold to merchant utilities and made a lot of money and other neighbors saw their views ruined by, by these lines. So why can't they run where those lines run?

Jada Jo: One of the [00:11:00] reasons we've been given is, you know, they can't be too close to existing lines, and so they have to run them a little bit further off. Um, I know whenever it particularly came to I 10, which we would've, you know, in our opinion. That's the best route. Go straight. I 10. Stay on the freeway the entire way.

Uh, but we do understand when you've got a station that's in Southwestern San Antonio or Southeastern San Antonio, it's hard to get across the entirety of the city. So we understand why they have to essentially zigzag. Um, through the hill country to get around the, the city to stay, you know, as close to these utility portals as possible.

Um, we can all speculate what it could do in the future, which, you know, I know that we were talking earlier about AI data centers and things like that, that's, that are coming to Texas. So all of these things, this infrastructure is gonna set up for the future of development in Texas. So it's like, let's just do it.

More responsibly and do it the right way. 

Bob Rivard: I want to [00:12:00] go back and just add the fact that you. Both of you are more than landowners. Ted, you're a founder of the Headwaters Alliance, which I want you to talk about, uh, which is advocated for environmental protections of, uh, of, of, uh, the Hill country for many years.

And, and then you also, um, are involved in the establishment of something called the Hill Country Alliance, which we can talk about. And, and Jada, Jo, you're an elected official. Uh, in Utopia on the, uh, Bandera County River Authority and Groundwater District. So you're both very involved with public policy and have been for years, and I just want to add those bonafides, uh, to, to, to, uh, the, you know, what I said additionally about, about who you are and what your interest is in here, 

Ted Flato: probably.

20 years ago, uh, during our, uh, two, uh, two droughts ago, um, the water levels, uh, the aquifer levels, the spring flows were all at a, at a, at a peak low, um, out in the hill country. And we have land like you've. You mentioned we have, we have the headwaters [00:13:00] of the West Oasis, and it's a dry part of the Western Hill country.

Um, but it was, it was significant. And so at that moment I knew that with water levels. Being at historic lows and spring flows being at historic lows, uh, we decided, or my family decided that it was time to bring people together because, um, uh, we might not have rivers in springs, uh, for future generations if we don't.

Come together instead of just, you know, working like, uh, just as single landowners, uh, in an isolated condition. And so we created this, uh, new alliance called the, uh, the Headwaters Alliance. And, uh, it's, and, and the idea was to bring landowners together who might have very different politics, but they would be united around one particular thing, which is keep our springs and rivers flowing for generations.

So that was a group. And we have gotten together, um, frequently during the year. Um, and, and then every once in a while [00:14:00] it's a little bit of a whack-a-mole. There's something that comes up the transmission lines most recently with that group. And then, but I needed also to be working with an already well organized group, and that is the hill country.

Alliance, which is um, which is a group that's been around now for 20 years and a fantastic group, a very nimble, bright group that really stitches together all of the different. Uh, environmental groups and there's a myriad of them in the hill country, brings them together often as one larger coalition and, uh, and is their job is to connect the dots and connect people.

And so they've been, they've been critical to the success of, of this. You know, small organization that I started and from that they've started a wonderful program called The Leadership Institute, which brings county commissioners and mayors and county judges [00:15:00] and um, water commissioners altogether. Every year a new group of people, a new group of officials to come together and discuss the issues and the challenges facing the hill country.

And it's a marvelous idea to approach these challenges from a regional perspective. So I've been very heavily involved in that. And interestingly enough, Jada Jo was a member of one of those. Of one of those cohorts. One year actually last year, and she met at our ranch. We met then. We had already been very involved in some other issues, other whack-a-mole things in the hill country, and so it was very fortuitous to have a lot of those connections already built so that when these.

When July and the transmission lines rolled out, we weren't starting from scratch. We had many, many groups of people that trusted each other. And so that is how we were able to build a [00:16:00] coalition from the end of the summer to currently, which is 48,000 members, uh, and 

Jada Jo: growing. That 

Ted Flato: is incredible. I don't think any transmission line discussion at the PUC has had 48,000 people.

Uh, you know, saying this is, you ought to put it in a different location. And so that's been fantastic. 

Bob Rivard: Well, I want to talk about the Public Utility Commission, uh, next steps, but before I do, in the opinion of you and your 48,000 supporters, is there an acceptable route? Here I is. The transmission line's future, uh, a done deal.

And have you all accepted the fact that one way or the other CPS energy and a EP are gonna build this line? And so therefore, do you have the least invasive route in mind? And how far away is that route in your view from what CPS energy and a EP are willing to do? 

Ted Flato: We know that this line is coming, [00:17:00] and so rather than just saying, no, don't do this.

No, we embraced it early on, so we all agreed at the tail end of the summer. Uh, to talk about it with CPS, we were also very lucky. CPS is a very different energy company from the, uh, electrical, from the LCRA as an example. Who, um, who put those lines in along I 10. That was an enormous fight. A lot of litigation to get it onto I 10.

But CPS being a citizens owned utility company and a fantastic utility company, we hoped that they would listen to us. And they did. They met with us. Now, they couldn't show their cards. And so it wasn't, you know, they, they didn't just go, oh, okay, yeah, we agree with you and um, and yeah, we'll go along with what your recommendations are.

They couldn't do that. But they did listen to us. And so, uh, our coalition put together a recommendation, what we called as Jada Jo alluded to the [00:18:00] least harmful route. Now someone is going to end up with these lines on their land, and it is going to be terrible. So least harmful is definitely least harmful.

But the idea was to make sure that these lines don't run through the Edwards aquifer recharge zone. The collection basin of all of those rivers and the devils in Pecos Canyons. 

Bob Rivard: That's a lot of land right there, you just described. 

Ted Flato: That is a lot of land and unfortunately they don't all line up. And so what we recommended was because we're down in Southwestern.

Corner of San Antonio, which is, you know, basically roughly where 90 runs into San Antonio. So to run out West, uh, to somehow go, we were recommending, uh, run along 90. Now, one of the challenges that CPS has, which they've shared with us, is the two most important [00:19:00] things to the PUC they say is cost. And housing and the environment and environmental issues and pristine environments that is, that is much further down the line.

And, uh, so running out 90 had its challenges they said, because, you know, there's a certain amount of housing that's in, in, in small towns that are all running along 90. But they saw the value certainly of running below south of the Edwards aquifer recharge zone and running at at parallel. And as long and kind of in the area of 90 running out west.

And so they listened to the logic of that and they appreciated that and they, and they acknowledged at the time, we talked a lot about that. The city of San Antonio has spent $400 million taxpayers voting on it every year for the last 20 years or whatever it's been to protect the Edwards aquifer recharge [00:20:00] that and.

That the idea of protection was to keep clear cutting from happening. Parking lots, being made developments over that area because our great fear. The citizens of San Antonio's great fear is that the Edwards aquifer, our sole drinking water, would be polluted by development over that recharge. Then, so the myriad of lines to go from southwest San Antonio, if they're going to cut through the hill country, they're gonna go slightly northwest.

They're gonna have to go through that recharge zone. So they showed them slicing and, and just going through and in between all of these. Uh, conservation easements that we as citizens of San Antonio had paid for. And they were just little areas that we just happened to have not yet acquired. I mean, we still, in San Antonio, we still have plans to spend an additional a hundred million dollars protecting more of the same area.

So it [00:21:00] was really flying in the face of all of this great work that the city had already done, and they acknowledged that that was. That there was a challenge there for them. They also acknowledged that it was expensive to run through the canyon lands and all this rough country, and that the flat lands below 90 would've, you know, certainly seemed that they might produce a less expensive route.

So they seemed to give us some light that it might stay. 

Bob Rivard: But you don't really know where matters 

Ted Flato: stand. No, we do. We do know now, but we pushed for the idea of, of ab staying below the recharge zone and then as you go march out west, then the challenge is the Devil's River Basin, the lower part of the basin where all the Great Canyon lands are, and, and amazing archeological, you know, cave paintings and, you know, incredible things.

We're 

Bob Rivard: talking about west of Del Rio here in 

Ted Flato: Bel Verde, Del County, west Rio. And so you need to. You gotta go, you gotta suddenly crank north on [00:22:00] 90, uh, to avoid that area. And so you have to make an S turn. And there's a Highway 2 77 that does just, that makes that s turn and goes northwest between the Oasis basins and the Devil's Basin.

So we were, our least harmful route begins in Southwest San Antonio. Runs parallel to 90 and just below the, the, uh, recharge zone. And then it, then it cranks north up to 77 and then it goes, and then we tried to go, we were recommending go as high as you could, go all the way to 10 and then go west along 10.

So ultimately though, Bob, the. Uh, the proposals are now out. So they listened, they revised, they added a few links. They took a few links away, and then they do this one thing. But a lot of the links still exist that run through the hill country, but their one preferred route is pretty much in alignment with that pathway of least harm.

Um, [00:23:00] it isn't running along highways, but it is, it is doing. Some of what we were recommending, which is to stay below the Edwards Afer recharge zone, go up between the devils, and then hang a left and go head to Fort Stockton. And so their, their recommended route, which is just, which is the second least expensive route, and the route that does the interacts with houses, I think almost the least.

And then it all has the, all the environmental attributes that we are pushing for. So it, it showed that they were listening. 

Bob Rivard: It's hard to imagine, uh, the infrastructure challenges of putting in high power transmission lines 180 feet tall towers through the canyon country. Is it physically possible? 

Ted Flato: Yeah.

You know, I, I. Uh, Rudy Garza was very, very generous about taking time and speaking. 

Bob Rivard: CEO of CPS 

Ted Flato: energy. The C-E-O-C-E-O [00:24:00] of CPS Energy was very generous with his time, and he spoke with, uh, the Nature Conservancy, uh, head of the Nature Conservancy, head of the Hill Country Alliance. Uh, and me and he though did say.

That, you know, he basically has never met a power line that he didn't like. I mean, he is in the business of building, he's an engineer. And so he said, no problem. You can build it wherever. We can build it wherever. So, however, he acknowledged that the canyon lands and the access to them. Uh, is is a lot more complex than running it out in the flats, in the open areas.

And, and so certainly there would be additional cost associated with that. Um, but, but in addition to the additional cost, the additional environmental risk is huge. You know, that is, that is land. The reason we have, uh, the city of San Antonio has bought up easements over the, the Edwards aquifer, um, recharge zone.

Is that It is, it is this [00:25:00] kars topography, this limestone that looks like a sponge. That unlike a lot of other land, uh, if you drop something on that land, it, it can get into the aquifer. I mean, it is a, uh, it is a very fragile place to build. So just the whole process of building these enormous towers and all the clear cutting and all the construction and all the trucks and all the access roads, huge risk, 

Jada Jo: massive 

Ted Flato: to, uh, environmental risk, not just to the landowner.

But really more importantly. To the much broader, uh, population of this area. 

Bob Rivard: You know, we're talking about this as a local issue, and I, I join you in my own admiration for our municipal utility and all it's accomplished over the years and, and for Rudy Garza's leadership, and he was on the podcast earlier and to some degree where.

We're localizing an issue that's really statewide. So we have an insecure energy grid, [00:26:00] which we saw during winter storm Uri in spades in 2021. Uh, but we've also seen the grid come under, uh, real stress in some of our hottest. Uh, months. So we're trying to strengthen the grid, and that's the build out.

You've got the Permian Basin, which is one of the largest oil producing and gas producing fields now, uh, in, in the world. And, uh, so we have this insecure grid, and yet we're the fastest growing state in the union. We have 500,000 new people coming every year. Uh, that's a million people every two years.

And, um, I think without. Putting words in Rudy Garth's mouth when he was on the podcast. I think he felt like the inevitable urban growth in this urban state probably means that we can't protect all of the rural view sheds the way they've been historically protected. Um, do you think that because of the growth in the urban areas that.

That's an inevitable truth, or do you think we can have it both ways? 

Ted Flato: I think, you know, I, one I [00:27:00] really appreciated your, uh, interview with Rudy. I thought you, the two of you guys, um, did a wonderful job of covering a lot of really important issues. But I did some of his comments. I, I, I, I. Disagree that you can't have it both ways.

Um, I think you can, uh, create grid security. You can get these lines out to West Texas without endangering this really critical resource that we have to, which is the Hill Country and the Devil's River and Pecos River Basins. Those are areas that. Not just those private landowners enjoy, but there are a lot of state parks.

There's a, the, the rivers are available to everyone. And so there is a lot of economic, uh, value and joy that comes from those areas. And so it is in everyone's interest to protect those. And so, and I, and I think you can, you can, you can run transmission lines in, uh, in logical places that are. Perhaps harmful [00:28:00] to some, but at least for the larger, greater good, uh, less harmful to, to, you know, these, these big environmental places.

And so I think in a perfect world that we would have a different approach though, to doing, to proposing these, these, uh, electrical lines, uh, rather than just throwing out a million lines with the objective of just letting landowners. Against landowners. I think really a more responsible approach would be great, which is that the utility companies and the state agree upon, um.

Logical areas to run these big lines so that you don't make everyone lawyer up, spend all this money and time and fight their neighbors. I mean, I think we need, I think we need more thoughtful leadership. That would be ideal. Where you say, this is where the lines ought to be run. And everyone buys land knowing that or owns land, [00:29:00] knowing that, and there's, there's more, there's more thought that goes into where you put these lines.

Jada Jo: Well, and I wanna chime in on that a little bit too. Mm-hmm. Because I wanna think, I wanna talk about the rural perspective. So when you're talking about this, you know, urban entities that need this energy, but it's, you know, gonna be affecting these rural communities that a lot of them are, they just. Do what they can to live off of the land so they don't have the means, you know, to, to really fight these things.

Um, that's where I think if leadership would take a, a more productive and proactive role at trying to get these corridors along highway infrastructure, then you're not. Cutting through these generational farms and ranches that folks, they're, that's their livelihood. 

Bob Rivard: And river basins. 

Jada Jo: And the river basins.

Exactly. And you know, you think of the hill country, you know, I live out there. I, everybody that lives out there is. You've got tourism in the spring and summer when people [00:30:00] are coming out for the rivers, whether they have got vacation rentals or they've got campgrounds or various, you know, ways to try to make money to, to cater to that community.

And then in the fall and winter you've got a hunting, uh, economy. And so both of those things would be devastated by having these massive lines cut through. Ranch lands. Um, not only that, but people have their cattle ranches, their multi-generational farms. Farms are already dying. Why hurt them even further?

And a lot of these folks that we've been helping with, the Hill Country Preservation Coalition, we did a lot of boots on the ground workshops over the last six months, just trying to help people navigate this whole process and understand the rights that they do have and even to intervene because these.

A lot of these folks, they can't afford the attorneys that other landowners can. Um, and they just, they need help just trying to protect their little piece of property that's been in their family forever. And once you take those away, it never comes [00:31:00] back. And so I feel like there's, there's things that we can do as Texans if we think about being good ancestors and for multi-generations to come, why not start being more thoughtful about how we.

Put this infrastructure in place and as we develop, you know, I'm not, I am, I'm an entrepreneur, so I'm, you know, definitely pro development to a certain extent. But let, there's a way to do it thoughtfully and responsibly, um, to have, be the best of both worlds to preserve these. Generational rural areas and also put in the infrastructure that we need as Texas develops as a, as a leading state of our, you know, country.

Bob Rivard: Because I keep my ear to the ground on the hill country and, and the, the ranching culture, I, I know about this, but the, the two of you find that you're not attracting the kind of media attention to this issue that you had hoped for. Um, and I, and I asked that with. The knowledge that, you know, our newspaper, [00:32:00] the San Antonio Express News used to cover the Hill Country inside out doesn't do that anymore.

And so many of those small town weekly newspapers just don't have the, um, throw weight to really cover a complex issue. And, and so I, I find at, at my end that there's been a dearth of, of material to read about this. 

Jada Jo: Absolutely. It's been hard because like you mentioned earlier, there's. So many different things that are going on.

There's the wall in Big Bend. Mm-hmm. Which got a lot of news coverage. You've got, um, WA Ranch, uh, and the wastewater treatment facility in San Antonio. You've got developments popping all over the place that are trying to discharge waste or, so when it comes to. This, even though this is a massive forever project, I don't think people really understand the scope of it, and it just hasn't caught the media like a lot of these other um, stories do when.

This is huge. Not only the Howard Solstice project, but we're [00:33:00] only one of three of the 7 65 KV lines in the state of Texas right now. And Ercot has already released the other next phase, which is an additional segment that goes along the eastern part of the state. Um. This forever changes our entire state, our landscape, everything about it.

It's so massive. And so it's kind of been a little bit disheartening in a way that, you know, we, we live and breathe this every day. This is, I basically have, you know, it's taken over our entire lives for the last six months. Um, just trying to spread word and, and let people know that they're coming and have a seat at the table to at least.

Say, Hey, let's do this a more thoughtful way, and let's really kind of work together for infrastructure and for rural Texas. 

Bob Rivard: If I'm a landowner, uh, Jada Jo, in the area of the proposed, uh, route that, that, that, uh, that you've discussed with CPS energy, what's gonna happen to my land? Is the condemnation process [00:34:00] where they're gonna arbitrarily say, we're paying X amount of dollars per acre.

Uh, you're a real estate, uh, expert and negotiator. Um, is this subject to negotiation? Are people gonna say, I want you to either buy me out, or is that not an option? Will people, whether they like it or not, uh, will they. Will they acquire wealth through this process? What? What's gonna happen here on the, I think I said 1.7 billion or 1.4 billion for the line?

Yeah. How much of that is gonna go into the pockets of landowners? 

Jada Jo: Oh, I'm not sure how much of that's actually gonna go into the pockets of landowners, but basically when CPS or a EP comes to you and decides, or I guess PUC decides the route, right? And once they decide that route, and the land agents for CPS and a EP come to you, um.

They're gonna come to you and they're gonna try to negotiate that easement. The best thing to do is negotiate that easement, because if you don't, they do have imminent domain in their back pocket and land condemnation and. It's better for you to negotiate with them and [00:35:00] try to get it the way that you want it on your property.

You can, you have some leverage. You do have negotiation power on where? Where's it gonna go? What portion of your property are they gonna put it on? Can they put it over here as opposed to over here? What kind of roads do you want them to build? As you know, to, to put, as they do this construction, you do have a lot more negotiation power if you work with them than if you are completely opposed to it.

And they go the eminent domain route because then basically eminent domain, it's gonna come to the commissioner's court, what do they deem the market value. And then that's just what you get. You have no negotiating power from that point. So what you, what you advocate is ne negotiate a long-term lease.

Bob Rivard: And don't, yes, negotiate with them. Don't let it get to eminent domain. Don't let it get to eminent domain. Be able to have some kind of say in some kind of power over the unfortunate part of this being on your property. I mean, if you're gonna have to deal with it, you might as well [00:36:00] at least have some say in where it's gonna go and how they're going to put the infrastructure to do so.

Ted Flato: But Bob, to be. Clear. The, the long term effect of the transmission lines on someone's property is going to devalue absolutely your land. So there is no financial gain, a net financial gain, uh, in this situation. It will 

Bob Rivard: offset the 

Jada Jo: long term, absolutely 

Bob Rivard: decline in value, 

Jada Jo: huge value. And it's not only the landowner that gets the, the line on their property, it devalues every neighbor around.

That doesn't even get any monetary settlement. So, you know, your neighbor gets a little tiny piece of the pie if they get a line on their property, but you have to look at it and drive under it every single day and you get nothing. 

Bob Rivard: There's, there's no compensation. Your, for losing your view shed, 

Jada Jo: no. Your view shed, but also property value.

And from the perspective of real, a real estate broker, I've never sold a property that has a transmission line on it to date because people look at them and they do not want them. There's not even any of these that exist [00:37:00] in Texas. So that just shows the ones that are here, I can't even sell a piece of property with.

These are much larger. 

Bob Rivard: Well, last question. Um, what, what happens next? Uh, are we, are we now back to where, um, the Public Utility Commission will be making a final. Um, decision on the route. Is that in the near term or what, what, what comes next? 

Ted Flato: So what's next is we have a couple of months, um, now it's the, the, it goes before the Texas Public Utility Commission, which is a, uh, four board members I believe now there's a new board member, I think, and they're appointed by the governor.

And, and they listened to, uh, CPS has already submitted. What, you know, they have a. You know, they've ranked their routes kind of, well, actually, I don't know that they've even ranked their routes. They have one route that they say is a preferred route, and then they have, uh, other pros and cons of other routes, costs associated with 'em, environmental conditions, houses, those kind of things.

And so, and then the PUC here is from all of the, what are known as interveners, uh, [00:38:00] testimonies about, you know, why this link is bad or why that link is better, or all those things. And so, and then they ultimately make a decision. Uh, and, uh, by the, by the time the summer rolls around. 

Jada Jo: Well, and I'm grateful that you brought up timeframe, Bob, because right now we're on a pretty strict schedule.

Um, and if there's inter any interveners out there listening, I would love to kind of talk about that. If you did intervene because you have a line that's potentially on your property, the. Deadline is April 17th. So we've got just a couple of days left for you to find to, to finalize your statement of position that you have to publicly list on the um Utility Commission's interchange website.

Portal. Um, so if anybody's gonna have expert witnesses or have any type of testimony, they have to file that by the 17th. So that's a deadline that's coming up pretty quick. The hearing is going to take place on the 18th and 19th, um, which is. All the interveners get to bring their, their experts and do their testimony [00:39:00] at that time.

Once you know that hearing concludes, then it basically shifts over to the PUC. You have this holding period from May until on or before August 29th when they make their final decision. 

Bob Rivard: Okay. Well, I hope you both agree to come back as the, as the issue continues to develop and, and we get to maybe the stage where the PUC is making their decision or has made their decision.

Uh, we're gonna wanna revisit this particularly after the actual construction, uh, starts to take place. 

Jada Jo: Thank you, Bob. Absolutely. Thank you for having us. 

Bob Rivard: Appreciate it. Thanks for coming on to Big City, small Town.

Cory Ames: All right y'all, thanks for listening to this episode of Big City Small Town. If you enjoyed this conversation, please share it with friends and colleagues who might find it interesting. You can also sign up for our newsletters, Bob VARs, Monday Musings and my San Antonio something. You can find those linked up at Big city small town.com.

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