Supreme Court set to hear spaceport appeal
Sep. 23—The Georgia Supreme Court will hear an appeal from Camden County seeking to invalidate the results of a referendum blocking the purchase of land intended as the launch site for a spaceport.
The Oct. 6 hearing will be held at the Augusta-Richmond County Municipal Building.
Camden County is challenging the legality of the March referendum where 72% of the votes cast supported blocking the purchase of land owned by Union Carbide.
The court will also hear arguments challenging Union Carbide's decision not to sell the land to Camden County following the referendum.
The Federal Aviation Administration granted the county a launch operator's license under the condition it closed on the deal with Union Carbide.
The court's decision could affect the ability of people trying to challenge projects approved by local officials.
The court ruling could also impact open records requests that have been denied to different individuals and organizations regarding the spaceport. The Southern Environmental Law Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of the environmental group One Hundred Miles to release the documents.
"Further delay in this case serves no purpose now that Union Carbide has confirmed they will not sell this property to Camden County," said April Lipscomb, senior attorney in the Southern Environmental Law Center's Georgia office. "The county no longer has a leg to stand on to withhold public documents from taxpayers who deserve to know where their resources are going."
A ruling on the open records request in Superior Court has been put on hold until it rules on the county's lawsuit.
"Camden County has spent millions of dollars on a spaceport that taxpayers have soundly rejected, all the while keeping residents in the dark and refusing to provide funding for critical county services like emergency response, animal shelters, and libraries," said Megan Desrosiers, president and CEO of One Hundred Miles.
"We need the documents now more than ever to understand how this bad project was greenlighted...so residents can hold county officials accountable."
Camden officials, according to arguments in its suit, claim Union Carbide "stonewalled and sought to avoid its contractual obligations."
"Rather than engage with Camden County to work towards completing required items under the option contract, Union Carbide was non-responsive or worked against Camden County's efforts to perform the contract terms," according to the complaint.
County officials claim the reason for Union Carbide's unwillingness to close on the deal had nothing to do with the referendum.
"Union Carbide's intent is to reap more money from the property through lucrative 'conservation easement tax credits,' combined with potentially selling the property for more money," according to the lawsuit.
