VELCO loses bid for re-trial in radio tower case, will appeal to Vermont Supreme Court

by John Herrick vtdigger.orgRutland Superior Court awarded $1 million in Decemberto landowners challenging the state’s transmission line company after it constructed a radio tower on their mountaintop property in Wells.
Vermont Electric Power Corp, or VELCO, sought a new trial, butthe court denied the motion Wednesdayand awarded the landowners an additional “prejudgment” interests rate for compensation.
The company said it will appeal the decision to the Vermont Supreme Court.
“It wasn’t a surprise,” said VELCO Vice President Kerrick Johnson. “And we are continuing to prepare our appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court.”
Felix Kniazev and Olga Julinska abandoned their home and moved to Boston after VELCO constructed a communications tower near their mountaintop home.
Last December, the trial court sided with the landowners and awarded them the amount of the property’s total appraised value in 2011 for property diminution resulting from construction of the new tower.
Julinska said Wednesday the couple will continue to defend their position in court.
“We’re definitely going to fight to defend this jury’s decision,” she said, “but the specifics of that I don’t really know.”
The company wanted to replace an existing radio tower used for communication between electric utility crews maintaining the state’s power grid. VELCO and the landowners were unable to settle on a price for additional easements necessary for construction of a new tower and have been litigating since.
In 2011, VELCO filed for condemnation before the Vermont Public Service Board, a procedure that allows private entities to force the sale of a landowner’s private property, in this case to expand the easement around the tower and widen a road. The board later ordered VELCO to pay the landowners $25,750 to cover the changes in the property resulting from the condemnation.
The company has said the property was the best for the project. Otherwise, VELCO would have had to put cell towers on two separate and undeveloped mountaintops to construct the radio facilities – a project that would not have produced the same quality of radio service and would have cost more than the jury’s award.