Eminent domain award determined in Russell County
RUSSELL COUNTY — Grain Belt Express began filing eminent domain petitions in several counties in Kansas well in advance of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Interest Corridor proposal in February 2024.
In the case of GBE v. Hammond Inc., petitions were originally filed in 2023 in both Pawnee and Barton County District Courts, because the tracts involved in the intended taking lie in both counties. Those petitions were rolled into one notice of hearing in Barton County due to the larger balance of property as well as owner’s place of residence were there.
GBE began filing nearly 40 petitions in the state of Missouri in the period from 2021-2024, with several dismissals.
This week, the Great Bend Tribune learned that results of an eminent domain action in May-June 2024 in Russell County was forwarded to the panel of appraisers tasked with determining an award in the Barton County case.
The Russell County case, filed as RS-2023-CV-300001 with Russell County District Court, listed GBE as plaintiff against Paul and Erin Renard, for title to a nearly 10-acre tract of land located in the vicinity of 18802 Land Road, Russell.
The appraiser’s report filed June 10, 2024 states that court-appointed appraisers Dave Beagley, Rex Soldan and Jeanine Byers-Long began the procedure with a site viewing on June 10, followed by public hearing with oral testimony, written evidence and damages assessment given at the Russell Public Library.
As per statute, the appraisers determined the fair market value of the entire property before the taking at $750,000, subtracting the value of the portion remaining after the taking at $600,000, leaving the just compensation and measure of damages determined as $150,000 for the 9.919 acre taking, or roughly $15,000 per acre.
A month after that hearing, local public meetings began to discuss the proposed Midwest Plains National Interest Corridor, which shared a significant portion of GBE’s planned route for its approved 5,000kv transmission line. On Nov. 25, the DOE’s Loan Program’s office announced a conditional agreement for a $4.9 billion loan to begin the first phase of the line’s construction through Kansas into Missouri.
On Dec. 16, 2024 the DOE dropped the Midwest Plains project from its original list of 10 corridors across the country. Three of the corridors currently remain in the proposal.
A closed-door conference involving the three members of a court-appointed appraiser’s panel was scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Friday at the Barton County Courthouse to discuss testimony given by both sides during a March 7 condemnation hearing, and whether it warranted a second hearing to be scheduled next week with both parties presenting additional testimony with a presiding judge in attendance.
The second hearing was requested by Tammy Hammond, owner of Rosewood Services, named as defendant in the petition filed by Invenergy, doing business as Grain Belt Express in Kansas. A two-week extension had been granted to the panel consisting of certified appraisers Barb Esfeld, Jason Mayers and Tyson Steffen, who convened Friday’s meeting to review testimony received and discuss possible alternatives.
Results of the session were not immediately available prior to Friday’s press deadline. Additional information will be released as soon as it becomes available.
Friday, March 28 was the original deadline for the panel to render a decision regarding a statutory fair-market award through the state’s eminent domain procedure for Hammond Inc., as owner-operators of Rosewood Services, a therapeutic horse ranch offering treatment options for clients with developmental disabilities, their parents and guardians.
At issue was an award amount of approximately 30 acres of Rosewood property in four tracts located along the Barton-Pawnee County line, to be utilized as easement ground by Invenergy, doing business in Kansas as Grain Belt Express, in construction of utility towers for a proposed 5,000kv electric transmission line. The line, as approved for construction, extends through Kansas and into Missouri for approximately 780 miles, as part of a multi-billion-dollar high-voltage direct-current transmission of electric energy generated in Southwest Kansas to conversion stations connecting four power grids in the Midwest.
Prior to the hearing, GBE invoked eminent domain by petition against Hammond Inc. setting up the hearing process. The hearing was to be the fourth of a seven-step statutory eminent domain proceeding, begun by GBE’s filing of a petition for title, followed by confirmation of the petitioner’s right to exercise eminent domain by 20th District Senior Judge Carey Hipp; and Judge Hipp’s selection of certified appraisers for the panel.
Because the actual hearing is not considered a judicial process, a request for a second hearing before a decision is rendered is unusual, and no provision exists in current Kansas statute relating to eminent domain process procedures. Case annotations to K.S.A. 26-506, regarding the time, place and manner of a hearing, do refer to the legal application of considering parol evidence as it relates to the value of the property being taken.
Parol evidence, as a legal term, refers to agreements or discussed information in the development of a binding legal contract that is revisited once the contract is written and executed, and is currently in dispute. In the case of an eminent domain hearing, as an administrative and not judicial action, parol evidence would be additional oral testimony added to the record for consideration by the appraisers’ panel.
