Colquitt County is waking up about the pipeline.

Alan Mauldin wrote for the Moultrie Observer 10 December 2013, Opposition grows against Sabal Trail gas pipeline,

Opposition to a proposed natural gas pipeline that would cut a swath through Colquitt County has galvanized in Southwest Georgia, from Albany to Valdosta…

In recent weeks the company has begun sending threatening letters to those who have held out, said Sandra Yarbrough Jones.

“I got a call in mid-October, (saying) this is your last chance or we’re going to court,” said Jones, whose home sits about two miles south of downtown Funston on Dunn Road. More recently “I got a letter from their attorney quoting Georgia law” about the use of eminent domain allowed for energy pipeline projects.

Jones also has relatives who farm in the area and the pipeline would come close to the home of son Greg Yarbrough and his family. But it would come much closer to hers, and that’s what scares her.

“That 10-inch line was put in in 1955,” she said. “They’re putting this 36-inch line next to that old cast iron pipe.”

Based on the proximity, Yarbrough believes a malfunction and explosion would destroy her home.

The proposed pipeline also would make a 50-foot swath of land required for an easement through her property on which she could not plant trees or use as she wishes.

“I’m maintaining they don’t have the power of eminent domain,” Yarbrough said. “This (route) has not been approved.”

And another landowner:

Irvin Allegood, who attended an Oct. 15 informational meeting at Moultrie Tech, said he is not interested in having the pipeline go through his property on Bay Road.

“I told them they’re not cutting a tree on my property,” he said.

In Lowndes County a group opposed to the route has organized under the name Spectra Busters. Yarbrough recently addressed that group.

-jsq

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