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Continue to show your support by signing this letter to Governor Walz

Thank you for your continued support of Minnesotans for Line 3. Please join us in adding your name and support to a letter that will be delivered to the Walz Administration in their first week of office. The letter highlights three reasons why Line 3 needs to be replaced and confirms Governor Walz’s continued support of the project:

  • The need to replace aging infrastructure
  • The thoroughness of the review process
  • The importance of investing in local jobs

Governor Walz, please take action; join us with your continued support of replacing Line 3 and direct your agencies to finalize the permitting process promptly.

Join 15,268 other Minnesotans by signing the letter today!

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January 2019

Dear Governor Walz and Lt. Governor Flanagan: We look forward to working with you and continuing to make northern Minnesota a great place to live, work and enjoy all that our natural resources have to offer.

We are writing to you, during your first week in office, to convey our steadfast support for Enbridge’s Line 3 Replacement Project, and to ask you to respect the process by rescinding a last minute legal challenge from the previous Administration’s Department of Commerce of a reasoned review and approval of the project by that same Administration’s Public Utilities Commission.  We also ask you direct your agencies to finalize the permitting process promptly, to achieve construction in 2019.

For four years, we watched this project – to replace aging infrastructure and further protect water quality in northern Minnesota — being evaluated. We heard Governor Dayton say “trust the process, trust the Public Utilities Commission.” So we did – and we participated.

We went to the 65 public meetings (15 held on tribal reservations), we submitted comments to the official project docket, we attended events, we put signs in our yards, and we wrote letters to the editor in our newspapers. Our local governments and organizations passed more than 90 resolutions of support for the project. Enbridge reached agreements with the two tribes directly impacted by the project.

Finally, after a robust evaluation and careful consideration of a voluminous record, the Governor Dayton-appointed PUC issued permits confirming a need to replace the pipeline by unanimous decision and issued a route informed in part by a thorough and robust environmental impact statement. The PUC reaffirmed their decisions on need and route, again by unanimous decision, in November and December 2018.

After the most comprehensive review in the history of pipelines in Minnesota the previous Administration’s Department of Commerce filed a court challenge to its sister-agency, the PUC’s decision.

Projects like replacing Line 3 do not come along very often. In anticipation of construction in summer 2019, our union halls are gearing up to put the local workforce to work near home. Our local businesses and companies are developing plans and considering the work force they will need to employ and accommodate to meet this economic boom. Our elected and public officials are creating budgets and determining where resources may be needed. This 350-mile project will provide so many benefits across northern Minnesota – all privately funded, infusing millions of dollars into our communities.

As you enter office, we, as a collective coalition of northern Minnesota elected and public officials, business owners, labor unions, and citizens, ask your administration to ensure we all put safety first by replacing aging infrastructure and protecting our natural resources, while investing in family- and community-supporting jobs.

With this in mind, we have three specific requests:

  1. We ask you to rescind the previous administration’s lawsuit against the Line 3 Certificate of Need and to move this project forward.
  2. We ask you to direct your agencies to finalize the permitting process promptly, to achieve construction in 2019.
  3. We ask you to join us in supporting the Line 3 Replacement Project.

We are happy to discuss with you and your Administration how replacing Line 3 will benefit our communities.