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Diana flies solo over power lines
Recants earlier stance
June 7, 2006
 By Brendan Scott
Times Herald-Record

Goshen - In the high-stakes fight to block a proposed high-voltage power line across much of the state, Orange County Executive Ed Diana increasingly is the odd man out.

Diana remains the only county chief along New York Regional Interconnect's 190-mile track who hasn't come out against the project. And the heat's on the Republican executive to hop off the fence to help block plans to channel big-city power through upstate.

"He's wishy-washy because he's being told by this investor group that we're going to get some of the power," state Sen. John Bonacic, R-C-Mount Hope said. "I only know what the Public Service Commission told me, that this power is to supply New York City to meet their increased energy needs."

Diana was poised to line up against the power lines as recently as May 16, when he told the Times Herald-Record: "I would come out against it. I don't see the need and the benefit."

But Diana recanted last week, after NYRI representatives visited Goshen and assured him the project would boost county tax revenue and cut local electric rates.

Once the project is completed, developers say the company would pay $97 million in annual taxes to Orange County communities. They also say it would trim statewide energy costs by $11.7 billion during its first 20 years.

"We need to keep the lights on," Diana spokesman Steve Gross said last week. While Gross said Diana has some environmental concerns about the project, the executive's official position is "no position."

That puts Diana at odds with a growing bipartisan cadre of public officials opposing the 1,200-megawatt power line, including leaders of Sullivan and the six other counties along the project's proposed routes.

It also puts Diana at odds with his own Legislature, which voted unanimously last week to oppose the power-line plan as now proposed. The project would traverse five Orange County towns from the outskirts of Port Jervis to western New Windsor.

Its high-voltage lines would bisect the Village of Otisville, encroach on the county-run D&H Canal Park and run hundreds of yards from existing high-voltage lines in the towns of Wallkill and Hamptonburgh.

"If he wants to stand out there alone waving the flag for this thing, that's his choice," said county Legislator Wayne Decker, D-Cuddebackville, who sponsored the anti-power line resolution.

Diana's office did not respond to a call yesterday.