Ray Schmitz's blog

You have been reading about the City of Rochester and the Mayo Clinic positions on the DM&E issue. I had a discussion last evening with a friend in Wyoming about the continuing opposition from people on that end of the project, not just to the extension of the line crossing individuals land but to it crossing anyones land. Hope you will keep that perspective in mind, the damage that will be caused by this project stretches from Wyoming to the Mississippi. Ranching isn't a rich mans hobby out there, but a life style that may not survive. They have spent a lot of their hard earned dollars fighting this project, they need our support in stopping the project.

I have been involved in the activity involving opposition to the DM&E railroad plan to extend it's tracks in to the powder river basin in Wyoming since shortly after it was announced, the city and county have joined the original group of residents who met and organized several years ago. Again we see the train looming on the horizon, this time because the federal government has agreed to become the lender of last resort for the railroad, actually that may not be accurate because the current law does not require the RR to have been unable to obtain private financing, but that is obviously the case.