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Maryland ban on hunting on some private land

Ohiosam

Ohiosam

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Mahoning Co.
The electric company got hunting banned in areas their survey crews were working. This is with no lease, compensation, or eminate domain. Look for this to happen in more places.
foxbaltimore.com

Judge grants motion preventing landowners from hunting during PSEG survey work

The judge approved a motion filed by Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG), which prevents landowners from hunting on their own property during survey work.
foxbaltimore.com foxbaltimore.com
 
I dont see how you figure the power company has no rights here? They pay the landowner for "right of way" and it reads to me that they can't hunt the "right of way" while it is being constructed.

I agree that it is bullshit and it shouldve been in the contract when the land debate was settled. @bowhunter1023 would be the person I called if in this situation. But a power company can't just put a line anywhere.
 
giles said:
I dont see how you figure the power company has no rights here? They pay the landowner for "right of way" and it reads to me that they can't hunt the "right of way" while it is being constructed.

I agree that it is bullshit and it shouldve been in the contract when the land debate was settled. @bowhunter1023 would be the person I called if in this situation. But a power company can't just put a line anywhere.
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They haven’t paid shit the landowners haven’t signed shit. The state hasn’t even approved the power line. The state requires the survey before they approve the power line and the power company doesn’t want to buy the ROW until it has approval.
 
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I'm a former landman, son of a surveyor, and work closely with AEP on local infrastructure projects. I'm also an outdoorsman as you know. All that said, I guarantee you there is a lot more to this story than is being reported, and I am not surprised this happened. In today's litigatious world where violence against things you oppose is encouraged in states like Maryland, I think this is in the best interest of the surveyors and to the general public who has vested interest in this public infrastructure project. A simple non-disclosure and an unrecorded Memorandum of Understanding is sufficient to have 1) avoided discovery and 2) made this a fair public-private partnership. I understand the optics, but equally understand the "why".

I work with ODOT a lot too. They don't do anything definitive until there's a body count (in terms of safety improvements on roads). Spend some time in the headlines and I'd bet a surveyor has been killed by a hunter/landowner/opponent on a project like this. Doesn't make this outcome right, but it's exactly the thing that leads to these sorts of "overreaching" judicial and legislative orders. That's the world we live in.
 
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Ohiosam said:
marylandmatters.org

Piedmont power line company wants to restrict hunting during environmental surveys - Maryland Matters

The company planning a power line across northern Maryland wants a federal judge to restrict hunting by landowners on days when surveyors are doing their work, but property owners said they would not entertain such bans "even for a minute."
marylandmatters.org marylandmatters.org
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Is that all property owners? Or just the ones they talked to?

Look, I'm in the middle of something right now that will be global news if it goes. I'll be able to write a book on it and there's some synergy between our project and what's going on with this issue. One of the lessons will be "you can't believe everything you read." I promise you, this isn't as simple as the press is making it out to be.
 
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bowhunter1023 said:
Is that all property owners? Or just the ones they talked to?

Look, I'm in the middle of something right now that will be global news if it goes. I'll be able to write a book on it and there's some synergy between our project and what's going on with this issue. One of the lessons will be "you can't believe everything you read." I promise you, this isn't as simple as the press is making it out to be.
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You have connections it that world. Ask them what is wrong with the reporting. It look like once again the big money fucks the landowners.
 
I would 100% be okay with a right of way being on a property i own. Those people are very well compensated. Temporary pain for long term overall growth.

That is all I have to offer with what I know at this point.
 
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giles said:
I would 100% be okay with a right of way being on a property i own. Those people are very well compensated. Temporary pain for long term overall growth.

That is all I have to offer with what I know at this point.
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I didn’t read any part of the stories shared in this thread, but I have 345 kV high-tension lines running across my property with a 150’ wide ROW easement, and I don’t receive a single penny from First Energy. As far as I know, no one does and no one ever has. It’s kind of bullshit if you ask me. I understand it’s for the greater public interest, but to not receive any benefit whatsoever is a real dick dragger.
 
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I have a 200' easement that goes the length of my property which covers about 10 or 11 acres. I'm pretty sure that some previous owner got some, likely one-time, compensation at the time of the construction, but that was probably more than 50 years ago. Today, this easement is 10 acres of tillable acreage that keeps me qualified for CAUV, which saves me roughly $4000 per year in property tax. I ask nothing of the local farmer who plants it other than keep planting it. The tax benefit is all I get, but that is significant, to me anyway. Edit: My easement belongs to AEP and this is a high voltage transmission line running through my place.
 
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jagermeister said:
I didn’t read any part of the stories shared in this thread, but I have 345 kV high-tension lines running across my property with a 150’ wide ROW easement, and I don’t receive a single penny from First Energy. As far as I know, no one does and no one ever has. It’s kind of bullshit if you ask me. I understand it’s for the greater public interest, but to not receive any benefit whatsoever is a real dick dragger.
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If they need access, you will get paid. Paid very well. I have laid mats right on planted fields many of times and the farmer smiles.
 
jagermeister said:
I didn’t read any part of the stories shared in this thread, but I have 345 kV high-tension lines running across my property with a 150’ wide ROW easement, and I don’t receive a single penny from First Energy. As far as I know, no one does and no one ever has. It’s kind of bullshit if you ask me. I understand it’s for the greater public interest, but to not receive any benefit whatsoever is a real dick dragger.
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Unless they used an existing easement, which would be on your title report, or eminent domain, I don't see how they could have done this without compensation. I would consider that atypical and would be interested to know how they justified it.
 
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giles said:
If they need access, you will get paid. Paid very well. I have laid mats right on planted fields many of times and the farmer smiles.
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giles said:
If they need access, you will get paid. Paid very well. I have laid mats right on planted fields many of times and the farmer smiles.
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We’ll see. They’ve come in for inspections and painting the tower legs a few different times over the past 5 years, and not once have I gotten anything. Actually, the one time, all I got were some ruts when the dipshit subcontractors nearly buried their truck in my lane where they shouldn’t have been.
 
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75 years ago the electric company wan
jagermeister said:
I didn’t read any part of the stories shared in this thread, but I have 345 kV high-tension lines running across my property with a 150’ wide ROW easement, and I don’t receive a single penny from First Energy. As far as I know, no one does and no one ever has. It’s kind of bullshit if you ask me. I understand it’s for the greater public interest, but to not receive any benefit whatsoever is a real dick dragger.
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75 years ago Edison wanted to run a wood pole transmission line corner to corner across our farm. It would pay $50 per pole for 6-7 poles. But it would also be a 25-30ft from center ROW. Dad had recently had a run in with Edison over a damaged car that Edison evoked "an act of God" to avoid liability so he wasn't in a cooperative mood. That power line makes a jog around us and the neighbors who got the $50 are long dead and other people are still dealing with those poles and Edison having access to their property.

But in that case someone sold or gave Edison those rights to their property. In this case no one has ever give anyone that right. It's has been taken from them.
 
No one here seems to understand that no landowner in history gave the power company any rights to this land. State law took that right from landowners and gave utility companies permission to trespass for a survey and now a Federal judge has expanded it to deny landowners their hunting rights.

That is completely different than dealing with an existing ROW.
 
I get it. And like your father, these landowners will have a chance to capitalize on it or have it built around them. I do not like idea of them suspending hunting, they shouldve had surveyors work with property owners and schedule it out. But, I dont know the details of what actually happened here. So I can't give an educated input.

As for people being gone and dealing with poles, you knew that when you bought the place. Like buying a car with a busted windshield, then wanting them to fix it years later.
 
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