JEROME, Idaho — Jerome County commissioners have paused a major transmission line project that would connect southern Idaho with Nevada and southern California after voting to overturn a special use permit approval.
The commission voted 2-1 Tuesday night to withdraw the permit for Great Basin Transmission's high-voltage transmission line project, which has been in development for decades. The decision came after an appeal highlighted missing documentation from the Jerome Highway District.
Watch to learn more about what led to the Commission's vote —
Commissioner Ben Crouch said the county's ordinance was clear about required documentation.
"Our Jerome county ordinance says that 'you shall have documentation from affected agencies,'" Crouch said. "So it said 'you shall have the documentation' and I just felt that, you know, if we're demanding, why don't we have it?"
The transmission line project comes as southern Idaho and the Magic Valley face a surge of energy production proposals on public lands, including the currently paused Lava Ridge Wind Energy Project.
Julie DeWolf Arroyo, one of the appellants who argued planning and zoning should not have issued the permit, drew connections between the transmission project and Lava Ridge.
"In the whole process of Lava Ridge, that thing that we all came together, no matter what our partisan difference is, where we all came together in those documents they name SWIP over and over and over," DeWolf Arroyo said.
She argued the projects are interconnected despite appearing separate.
"When you start looking back over those documents, you start seeing that they are the same beast: one is the head, one is the tail. When they got a 'no' on the head, they went for the tail, but it is the same project," DeWolf Arroyo said.
Beyond the missing Jerome Highway Department review, Crouch also requested that Great Basin Transmission obtain a Federal Aviation Administration review and update a Bureau of Land Management letter of review from 2010.
Despite the pause, Crouch expressed confidence that the project would likely move forward eventually.
"Yeah, this will probably go through, but let's make sure it's done right," Crouch said.
The commission has 10 days to make its decision official in writing.
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