Judge: LNG foes now have papers Tribal group pans facility construction

BANGOR – A judge has ruled that the Passamaquoddys who oppose construction of a liquefied natural gas terminal on tribal land have received all the documents they are entitled to under the federal Freedom of Information Act.

In a ruling issued Friday, U.S. District Judge John Woodcock also criticized the way the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs handled requests for information from We Take Care of Our Land, a group of Pleasant Point reservation residents who oppose the proposed LNG terminal at Split Rock.

In his 35-page order, Woodcock used milder language to chastise BIA officials than he did last year when he scolded attorneys for not providing documents after the Passamaquoddy group’s repeated requests for public information.

The information was sought under the federal Freedom of Information Act, a law that allows the public to obtain records of federal agencies unless the records are exempt from disclosure.

“Without commenting on the merits of the project,” Woodcock wrote, “the court is concerned that the delay in disclosing these documents leaves the BIA open to the charge that it has stonewalled the FOIA request, because it asks for documents that will lead to increased public scrutiny. If so, such actions are contrary to the letter and spirit of FOIA.

“Nevertheless,” he concluded, “the court is not convinced that the BIA’s responses here represent the type of impermissible pattern and practice the law contemplates.”

We Take Care of Our Land – Nulankeyutmonen Nkihaqmikon in the Passamaquoddy language – filed three lawsuits in U.S. District Court in Bangor because its members believe their viewpoints were not represented in May 2005 when the Pleasant Point Tribal Council signed a partnership agreement with Quoddy Bay LLC, the Oklahoma developer that wants to build an LNG facility on tribal land.

The group’s ultimate objective is to reverse the lease decision and reopen discussions. Members also want to provide an opportunity for all tribal members to vote on the project.

In November, Woodcock dismissed two of three lawsuits, ruling that the organization did not have standing to bring them and that they had been filed too soon.

Those decisions were appealed and the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston heard arguments earlier this month but has not issued a decision.

Efforts to reach attorneys Sunday about the most recent decision were unsuccessful.

The LNG opponents in June 2005 first requested information related to the tribe’s leasing of tribal land. Documents eventually were released, but not until administrative appeals and lawsuits had been filed.

“A FOIA requester should not have to undertake multiple requests, administrative appeals, and legal action in order to obtain documents the law allows it to obtain,” Woodcock said in his ruling. “It is also disturbing that the requested documents are central to an issue of public and tribal significance, the building of an LNG terminal on tribal lands, and that [the group] has taken a dissident view of the project, one that challenges its construction.”

Woodcock held a hearing in April over 20 documents that BIA said it had legally withheld or redacted portions of under FOIA.

Robin A. Friedman, the agency’s attorney, admitted then that the BIA had mistakenly withheld documents and said that it should not have taken four separate searches of records to find the information the organization was entitled to have.

Friedman said in April that We Take Care of Our Land now has all the documents covered under FOIA and Woodcock agreed.