The Battle over Big Coal: Strange Bedfellows are Taking on big Energy in Manistee -- and Winning

May 5, 2004

Fred LaPoint isn’t exactly what you’d call a textbook radical. He’s always worn his hair short, considers himself a big supporter of the armed forces, and at 49, had never attended a demonstration in his life.
So when he learned of a Houston developer’s plans to build a 425-megawatt coal-fired power plant in his job-starved hometown of Manistee, he actually thought it might be a good thing. It didn’t even bother him that the 20-story facility and 400-foot smokestack would be installed right across the street from the home he’d just spent thousands of dollars remodeling.
But within weeks of learning of the plan, LaPoint, who fights fires by day, would find himself leading a coalition of diverse allies in an effort to put an end to Houston’s coal-fired dreams. Angry, “not-in-my-backyard,” mostly middle-class citizens (a.k.a. NIMBY’s) were joining ranks with leaders from the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians -- whose successful gaming casino still sits uneasily with area residents -- and a wily crew of anti-privatization activists with a penchant for direct action.
An unlikely coalition—yes. But even more shocking -- they’re actually winning.
In mid-April, city planners dealt the coal plan a fatal blow, denying a required permit for the project over environmental, economic, and public health concerns. And while the city’s vote on the project was unanimous, a citizen victory over the state’s big energy interests was hardly a foregone conclusion.

EASY MONEY
Many in Manistee -- including the city council and planning commission, which endorsed the plan without hesitation, much less review -- saw the project as an economic boon for an area short on living wage jobs. 
“We were rocked really hard in the 1980s when three of the city’s major employers packed up and left basically overnight,” LaPoint explained.
“When this plan came along, there was the mindset that ‘this is all we deserve, we have no place to go, we have no way to change it, so we’re going to stick it out and take whatever crumbs are given to us.’”
And the project may well have been fast-tracked if not for leaders from the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians, according to LaPoint. Realizing the need to move quickly, the local tribe organized a public meeting on the issue in October 2003.  When hundreds of citizens turned out to voice their concerns about the plant’s potential environmental and public health impacts, LaPoint began asking questions of his own.
“I consider myself a pretty informed guy,” he said, “but I just didn’t know anything about coal-fired power plants.”
“The more I learned, though, the more I realized I didn’t want this in my community. I didn’t even want it in my state,” he said.
And LaPoint wasn’t alone. Joining with other area residents to form Manistee Citizens for Responsible Development or CFRD (pronounced “See forward” or sometimes affectionately, “See Fred”), LaPoint and company began digging up information to find out how the project could be stopped.

DEEP DIGGING
Stonewalled by city officials, the group used the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to uncover a series of illegal closed-door sessions between Joe Tondu, the project’s developer, and city and regional energy officials.
“We were able to uncover all sorts of lies,” LaPoint said. “We found out about secret negotiations between Tondu and the city, and Tondu and the Michigan Public Power Agency (MPPA). We found out he was telling his investors one thing, the city another, and the MPPA another. This was crucial to undermining his credibility,” he said.
Encouraged by the success of their initial fishing expeditions, CFRD members pounced next on the city’s planning commission, which they discovered was required to review the project under the city’s zoning ordinance.
With the help of anarchist organizers from Sweetwater Alliance (who only half-jokingly refer to themselves as “rent-a-riot”), CFRD went door-to-door to rally area residents against the project. Given just weeks to prepare, the coalition organized hundreds from around the region to attend three crucial public hearings, giving over nine hours of testimony, with all but a few speaking against the plan.
When the dust settled, the commission had unanimously rejected the permit and sent Tondu back to Houston licking his wounds -- beaten by a most unlikely set of allies.
“The diversity of the coalition was so huge,” LaPoint said. “We had doctors, PhD’s, psychologists, and attorneys. We had blue collar workers, laborers, firefighters, and farmers. We had moms and dads, grandpas and grandmas, and even young kids.”
“We cut across all economic and ideological backgrounds,” he said. “It became impossible to point the finger and say ‘you’re just a bunch of radicals’. Without the participation of all the groups… this could have turned out much differently.”

WHAT NEXT?
Tondu, however, is probably not the last Manistee will see of Big Coal. Given the city’s port access to Lake Michigan and Manistee County’s “non-attainment” status (the EPA’s designation for counties where greenhouse gases like the ones produced by coal-fired power plants are not federally monitored), other players in the state’s energy lobby are likely to push a coal-based future for Manistee.
Chief among them is the Michigan Public Power Agency, the cooperative of 13 Michigan municipalities which backed the Tondu plan, and which is still looking to build a sizable power plant, probably coal-powered. MPPA members have already looked at a 40-acre site in Stronach Township on the east end of Manistee Lake as a possible location, though the agency denies having purchased any land or having signed contracts with new developers.
Given how thoroughly citizens dispensed of the Tondu proposal, others may not be anxious to try their luck -- at least not yet. But if they do, all indications suggest that LaPoint and company will be there to meet them.
“We’ve been motivated to continue something that we’ve started,” La Point said, “to carry out a vision for a green -- and I don’t just mean dollar-wise -- future for Manistee.”
“We can be a showcase community, not just for Michigan, but the country,” he said. “We can show them that we don’t just have to rely on city hall or county or state government to illicit change and do things in a responsible clean and green fashion.  We can start it all from a grassroots level.”

  Lou Blouin is an organizer with Sweetwater Alliance. For more information on this and other issues visit www.waterissweet.org.