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pletely consistent with easements we’ve been accepting in the past,” said Atherton, who served on the county Planning Commission for 20 years before winning election to the board in 1999 and a second time in 2003. “These certainly are as desirable as any easements we’ve taken.”
He bluntly addressed “anticipated” allegations tKat Fauquier would accept easements to thwart Dominion. “We’re not taking crappy easements to stop a power line,” Atherton insisted.
Rather, the Fauquier board wants quality easements that protect valuable natural resources to “further a longrange comprehensive plan goal ... which frankly, is not what the power line does.”
Does Atherton believe a conservation easement could put the breaks on a transmission line?
“It’s fairly new ground,” the Marshall District supervisor replied. “We don’t know.” Fauquier County Attorney Kevin Burke declined to say whether he advised the supervisors whether a conservation easement would supersede a power line.
“I don’t think from the county’s standpoint it would be appropriate to discuss the extent to whether (easements) would trump the power line,” Burke said. He also refused to say whether at some point Fauquier would refuse to accept easements for land in potential Dominion alignments.
Piedmont Environmental Council vice president Doug Larson praised the landowners and the board.
Their actions add substantial land under easement in Fauquier, which includes 70,000-75,000 acres protected through the Virginia Outdoors Foundation, county government and other entities, Larson said. “We certainly applaud the county’s willingness to do this and to do it in an expedited fashion.” Some landowners submitted their easement requests on the board meeting date.
Dominion’s transmission line proposal puts VOF, a quasigovernment agency, in a difficult position.
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