State lawmakers are working on potential draft legislation that would include Tribal governments on the list of entities that must be notified about applications for industrial siting permits near them.
Currently, state law only requires “local governments within the potentially impacted area” to receive notification – including a description of the proposed project and an opportunity to ask the applicant questions at least 30 days prior to submission of the application.
Those local governments also have the opportunity to become official “parties” to the industrial siting permit hearing, Holland and Hart Partner Jeff Pope told the Wyoming Legislature’s Joint Minerals, Business and Economic Development Committee this week.
He asked the committee whether Tribal governments in the “potentially impacted area” would also have the chance to become “parties” to the hearing if they were included among the entities receiving notifications, adding that, “from the perspective of industry, that introduces the potential of a new objecting party.”
“The goal of industry (is) to minimize the potential objecting parties,” Pope said. “Not to cut them out of the process, but I think it either needs to be made clear in the legislation that they can be parties, (or) that they should not become parties to the permit proceeding.”
He noted that state law already requires Tribal governments to be notified, and to be given the opportunity to become parties to the hearing, when projects are located on Tribal lands.
Impact assistance
Pope also wondered whether the proposed new notification requirements would affect Tribal governments’ eligibility for “impact assistance” money.
“Typically, the local governments who receive notice are the ones who would become eligible for impact assistance payments,” he explained. “I don’t know if the committee wanted to do that, or is thinking of doing that, but (that) could be read as the direction of the legislature, because affected local governments who receive notice primarily receive that notice so they can participate in the impact assistance process.”
As part of that process, industry representatives usually approach local governments that are eligible for impact assistance payments so they can find ways to “participate in that community (or) make donations,” Pope said.
He predicted that his industrial clients would “try to anticipate whether or not Tribal governments will become eligible for impact assistance payments (so) they know whether to engage with those governments (or) not,” so “a clearer statement of what it is the legislation is trying to accomplish would help.”
“Something to the effect of, ‘This is simply to provide notice and there are no … other rights that go along with it,’ (would) provide the clarity where I would be able to tell my industrial clients how to navigate their engagement strategy with local communities and also to be able to predict who is and who is not a party to a permit hearing,” he said.
Tribal Relations
The Minerals Committee didn’t take action on the bill draft this week, opting instead to wait until after the Select Committee on Tribal Relations meets next month.
Wyoming Sen. Affie Ellis, R-Cheyenne, who is a member of the Minerals Committee and co-chair of the Tribal Relations Committee, said local Tribal representatives will have a chance to offer public comment on the proposal during that meeting.
“These bills haven’t been fully presented to either of our Tribes, so I don’t want to relay to the committee that there’s support or non-support,” she said. “The question that we’ll be (asking) the Tribes is, do you want just the notification, or do you want it to be something more and maybe perhaps be eligible to receive some financial assistance?”
The Tribal Relations Committee meeting is scheduled to take place Aug. 26 in Classroom 7 at the Frank B. Wise Business Center in Fort Washakie.