Great Falls Tribune
July 31, 2008
MEIC back in court seeking files that may contain trade secrets By ZACHARY FRANZ Tribune Staff Writer
A Helena-based environmental group filed a motion in Cascade County District Court on Wednesday in an effort to stop the city of Great Falls from holding back documents related to the proposed Highwood Generating Station.
Montana Environmental Information Center won a lawsuit last month that forced the city to turn over hundreds of pages of papers detailing plans for the coal-fired power plant, in which the city has already invested millions of dollars.
The city made most documents available last week, but withheld at least three papers because the group with which the city is partnering in the coal plant deal said those papers contained trade secrets.
Southern Montana Electric Generation and Transmission said it might eventually hand over the remaining documents after their attorneys have had the chance to review them.
That's not good enough, said Ann Hedges, program director for MEIC.
"We want to see what's going on," she said. "The public has a right to see what decisions its government is making, where money is being spent."
Great Falls City Attorney David Gliko declined to comment on the motion, which he hadn't had a chance to review.
In a letter delivered Monday, SME also asked the city to stop allowing public access to all the documents related to the coal plant until the corporation could review them to make sure they didn't include proprietary information.
The suit filed Wednesday also asks that the court not allow the city to take back or withhold those papers.
"The city needs to get a little bit of a spine, and tell SME they don't get to decide which documents get handed over Ñ the city gets to decide," Hedges said.
Hedges said she doesn't know what might be in the three documents the city won't hand over, or if there are other documents the group hasn't been allowed to see.
"We feel like we have nowhere else to turn besides going back to the court," she said.