A group representing more than 180 households wants the city council to help them fight a new power substation. The homeowners are afraid, though, that they might be running out of time.
“The City of Allen already passed a resolution against this. We want to know why our city council hasn’t done anything yet,” said Deb Eshbaugh. Eshbaugh is one of a half dozen homeowners from the Avalon Community who attended Tuesday’s council meeting to voice their concerns. The Avalon neighborhood is located just north of Highway 121 and east of South Lake Forest, a recently-completed development of about 225 houses and soon-to-open McGowen Elementary School. “Brazos Electric wants to put up a substation and power line at our neighborhood to provide electricity to Craig Ranch two miles away,” said John Wei, one of the organizing neighbors.
Neighbors on-hand at the council meeting explained that Brazos Electric plans to build the power substation on three acres at the southwest corner of the development. The power lines are slated to go up within 300 feet of the southern-most homes.
“There is a lot of land at Craig Ranch and plenty of room behind the Super Target [at Custer and 121]. Why can’t they build it near Craig Ranch? That’s who is getting the power from it,” said Danny Dong, another protesting homeowner.
Dong is one of the neighbors who walked petitions around the neighborhood, gathering more than 180 households’ worth of signatures. Horseshoe Bend, the older development to the immediate east of Avalon, has also recently completed a petition drive.
“Brazos had a public hearing about this back in March, but none of us knew about it. Mayor [Bill] Whitfield was at that meeting and the record from that meeting shows that he requested the power lines be underground,” Eshbaugh said.
The neighbors said none of them knew of the proposed power substation until the homeowners living along the southern edge of Avalon received letters dated two weeks ago on May 14. “I got one of these letters because my backyard is 300 feet from where the power lines will go up,” Eshbaugh said.
The concerns include complaints including the fear of a drop in property values and possible health concerns.
“The medical concerns [about cancer] aren’t proven, but there is some research supporting it. And from a friend of mine at TXU, I’ve learned that there is a high-pitched whine that these substations produce that can be heard a mile away,” Eshbaugh said.
Huff isn’t sure how much the council can help, but he plans to meet with the neighbors and work with city attorneys to draft a resolution.
“I’ll be coming back to you in two weeks with a resolution,” Huff told the council. He spoke about the City of Allen’s actions on the matter, passing a resolution to not allow the power lines to run along the south side of 121. “Somehow the City of Allen got in on this early and trumped us, saying they want no part in this,” Huff said. “We need to offer our support to our citizens.” Eshbaugh doubts they have much chance of killing the substation, but hopes for some modifications to the plan – to get the power lines moved farther away from her neighborhood.
“Mr. Huff said the best we can probably hope for is to get [Brazos’] second alternative, which is to move the power lines south to run right along 121 rather than 300 feet from our property lines,” Eshbaugh said. “That might mean the power lines are 600 feet from my backyard instead of 300 feet.” Huff plans to present his resolution to the council at the June 18 meeting. The deadline for filing an intervention with the Public Utilities Commission is June 29, but Avalon wants to have their intervention filed by June 19.
