Posted on 11/18/2006 5:43:33 PM PST by Dane
Shuler's election means end of quest to finish 'Road to Nowhere'
The Associated Press CHARLOTTE, N.C.
After an election that removed its chief backer from the halls of Congress, the Road to Nowhere may once and for all be going nowhere.
Heath Shuler, an incoming Democratic congressman who will represent far western North Carolina, opposes spending hundreds of millions of dollars to build the road through an undeveloped section of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The road would be a replacement for a state highway flooded by construction of Fontana Dam in the 1940s.
And that likely means the end of a project that was backed by Rep. Charles Taylor, the powerful Republican incumbent Shuler ousted earlier this month.
"We've said from the very beginning that we think the road has the appropriate name," Shuler told The Associated Press. "We don't need to build that road. The appropriation to build that road is now a dead issue."
The issue is near to Shuler's heart. He grew up in Bryson City, at the eastern end of the planned road, which would to follow the north shore of Fontana Lake. A 1943 agreement between North Carolina and the federal government included a promise to build it, provided Congress appropriated the money.
Only seven of 42 miles were completed before high costs and environmental concerns halted construction in 1972. Supporters of the road have continued to lobby for its completion, saying it would give residents forced out by construction of the dam access to family cemeteries and homesteads. The National Park Service now pays to transport those people across Fontana Lake by boat for their annual cemetery decoration days.
"Heath Shuler should be ashamed of himself," said Linda Hogue, a leader in the North Shore Road Association and an organizer of the boat trips. Hogue said she hopes a National Park Service study of whether to finish the road will continue despite Shuler's opposition.
"I hope Mr. Shuler is not as powerful as he thinks he is," she said. "I hope that someone in Washington can hold the line. It's only fair to let the process play out."
Taylor, a member of the House Appropriations Committee, revived conversation about the road in 2000, when he included $16 million to resume construction in the federal budget. That kicked off a lengthy study conducted by the National Park Service, which has included multiple public hearings and issued a draft environmental impact report early this year.
The report identified five possible alternatives for resolving the long-running debate, including doing no further work on the road and making a $52 million payment to Swain County to buyout the 1943 agreement; and extending the road to the dam _ a project that comes with a projected price tag of some $600 million.
In a break from tradition, the park service did not identify a "preferred alternative" in its draft report; many observers have speculated that the agency was waiting to see whether Taylor would win his re-election fight with Shuler. The park service has called the settlement with Swain County the "environmentally preferred" alternative.
Bob Miller, a spokesman for Great Smoky Mountains National Park, said the final decision about what alternative to recommend is now in the hands of new Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne and new National Park Service Director Mary A. Bomar. Both, he said, "must be brought up to speed with a lot of issues across the country. So we do not know when they'll render a decision."
Even if the park service came down in favor of building the road, Congress would have to appropriate money for construction. And that seems unlikely with Shuler _ and not Taylor _ representing the district.
Shuler said he intends to push for the settlement _ an option that has been endorsed by the Swain County board of commissioners, North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley, Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander and the Washington-based taxpayer watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense.
Alexander has called completion of the road _ which would cross one of the largest roadless tracts of land in the eastern United States _ a "terrible idea." Easley has said almost "any construction activity on the north shore of Fontana Lake threatens the delicate balance of streams, woodlands and wetlands that we in North Carolina are working diligently to protect and preserve."
Shuler, a former NFL quarterback who led Swain County High School to three state titles in the late 1980s, said during his campaign that he often went to a quiet spot near where the road dead-ends to mull major life decisions. It was there that he decided to attend college at the University of Tennessee and to propose to his wife Nikol.
Shuler said he would like to see money spent to improve the pontoon boat service that takes families across Fontana Lake to the hard-to-reach family cemeteries.
"I sympathize, and my heart goes out to the people that have their families out there," he said. "We need to do a much better job of transportation into Great Smoky Mountains National Park for the people that have cemeteries to visit. We need a fund to make it more accessible."
David Monteith, a Swain County commissioner who supports finishing the road, said Shuler's action on the issue will determine whether he lives up to a campaign promise to bring "mountain values" back to Washington.
"We have a legal binding contract signed by the federal government to fulfill that road," Monteith said. "Once Heath Shuler takes the oath of office, he's got no other choice _ if he's going to have any integrity or mountain values or whatever _ but to honor this contract. If he does not, his mountain values have run out the door."
And also the breaking of a Federal contract?
How convienient.
The contract was not breached since it was subject to the condition precedent of government funding. If it were up to me, that condition precedent would never be met, until such time as the sun expanded and consumed the earth.
Is that a legal opinion or what?
Uh no a moral one, where an FDR era promise was made and should be kept.
The executive branch does not have the power to constrain the Congress to appropriate money. The contract isn't worth the paper it is written on, and it is a waste of money, period. It is just a bondoggle to some county that wants to get lucky.
IOW, you admit that FDR snookered the families of Swain county who were displaced by Fontana lake.
It might be "moral" to give the heirs of the families money perhaps for the value of their roadless land, although it does not seem the own any land at this point in the national park. That is about it. The County is just dialing for dollars.
You can bet if the project were in an inner city in the district of a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, it would have been funded years ago.
Also I can't see the memorial services lasting much longer (maybe 25-30 years) before the next generation just drops it off altogether. And because of the view up there I'm not sure I'd want a road running through that area. I don't want it turning into another 441 (that road between Cherokee and Gatlinburg). The other thing is where the other end comes out. If it gives riders another route to the Tail of the Dragon I really wouldn't want it to be built. I ride but I also respect the old ways and the old towns up there. Franklin has been overrun, Murphy's just hanging on last time I checked, and Bryson City is one of the last (even though they have filmed a few movies up there)
And what is so "immoral" of completing the FDR era promise of a road?
Ah yes, the new 'conservatism'. Not only praise FDR but continue his policies. Tell me Dane, have you been up there before? I mean this road specifically.
LOL! My poor Redskins.
I see both sides of your point. There's not an ideal outcome at this point; like the TVA, they can't go back and undo everything!
Where am I praisng FDR? All I'm saying is that the FDR administartion promised these familes a road, and it looks like a democrat in FDR's shoes(Heath Shuler) is going to renege on that promise.
Ah, Joyce Kilmer, one of my favorite places.
BTW, bill, I have no idea if the familes own the land or if they have the right to develop the land commerically, but why should you dictate how these familes use their land and also go with Heath Shuler's reneging on a FDR era promise of a raod.
The road was promised but times change as well. The promise is important but no longer a moral one. The amount of damage it will more than likely do to the area outweighs the promise
Whew put your resume into the EPA, they love elitists like you.
Many, MANY, examples of "NOT"!
It is a common tactic for Gov. Org. "agencies", law firms, and other vermin, to simply draw a situation out until there is no one left to demand it's resolution.
No doubt once just a few more old timers pass on the Gov. Org. will simply say that the remaining "stake holders" are too few to justify any further expense.
The story is incomplete, were these people bought out or do they still own land beside the graves that cannot be accessed via normal means since the dam was built?
Are they being kept out of their homes and off their property?
Similar dirty doing's are being carried out against our veterans, particularly W.W. II vets.
H.R. 2088 should have been enacted with virtually no discussion, as a matter of justice for our veterans.
Instead the R!? chairman of the judiciary blocked it being brought to a vote.
Another couple of years and there will again be too few left for Gov. Org. to have to care.
Just another reason I could not find the energy to get more involved in the recent election.
I've been going up there myself since I was a kid and building a highway through there would be a travesty even if it were for a good reason, which this is not. It's not even about the road anymore - it's about the money. They need to just settle it out and move on. As for the cemetaries, what more could you want for them than to fade away into the serenity of the Blue Ridge Mountains?
As for the legal justification, the cash settlement would compensate Swain County for the inundated roadway and bridges. It's an eminent domain issue.
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