Pipeline interview transcripts released ahead of Friday hearing

The state Department of Environmental Quality released interview transcripts and written statements Monday from regulators who said the governor didn't interfere with the department's Atlantic Coast Pipeline approval.

The releases came ahead of a joint legislative subcommittee meeting Friday, when Republican lawmakers plan to question officials from Gov. Roy Cooper's administration about the approval process and its connection to parallel negotiations on a $57.8 million mitigation fund that the governor would have controlled.

Several DEQ officials, questioned by private investigators legislative Republicans brought in to explore the issue, said they didn't know about the fund until they read about it in the media. They also said they didn't feel pressure to deviate from regular permitting processes.

"Was it ever relayed down to you that there was – the governor was involved in the permitting process?" an investigator asked Jay Zimmerman, who was the director of the Division of Water Resources at DEQ during much of the permitting process.

"No, that was not," Zimmerman replied, according to an interview transcript posted by DEQ.

"Did anyone at any time above you, either Sheila Holman or anyone above, give you direction as to make additional information requests that you didn't agree with?" the interviewer asked.

"No," Zimmerman replied.

Holman is assistant secretary for environment at DEQ.

Initially, the administration wouldn't let employees speak to the investigators outside of public hearings. That changed at least a month ago and after Cooper signed a new whistleblower protection bill into law, according to Pat Ryan, spokesman for Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger.

That bill bubbled out of the pipeline fund fight, which goes back to early 2018.

In January 2018, the Cooper administration announced a key permit for the line, which would bring in natural gas from West Virginia. On the same day, the administration announced the mitigation fund, which would finance grants the Cooper administration would have laid out rules for later, starting with an executive order.

The GOP-controlled legislature immediately cried foul and passed a law rerouting the money, if it ever gets paid, to public schools along the pipeline route. The pipeline itself has been delayed since then, its fate tied to a case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Six interviews with DEQ employees were conducted Oct. 4. They were recorded and the transcripts placed online Monday. Four signed statements from DEQ employees are all dated Oct. 31, and a DEQ spokeswoman said employees were given the option of sitting for interviews or producing a written statement.

Both are available online, on a web page where the DEQ has made a trove of pipeline documents available. The download links are labeled "DEQ Staff Interview Transcripts" and "DEQ Staff Statements."

Among the interviewees: Brian Wrenn, who was the project's hearing officer. Interviewers with Eagle Intel Services asked Wrenn about emails that show him working late on a Friday night and on a Sunday in the run-up to the final permit announcement, then asked about a schedule from Ken Eudy in the Governor's Office, laying out announcement plans.

Eudy had helped negotiate the mitigation fund, and Cooper's critics have repeatedly questioned whether the permit was held up until the mitigation fund was set in an effort to squeeze money out of Duke Energy and other pipeline builders.

"Did you recall any conversations with anyone about we need to get this out per the request of the Governor's Office?" an investigator asked Wrenn.

"Again, nobody – we didn't have any directives from anybody as far schedule," Wrenn replied.