Jody McCaffree wants more time for landowners to review documents about the proposed liquefied natural gas terminal and gas pipeline. Jon Barton wants to debunk the idea that LNG would put the Coos Bay area at risk.

They plan to share their views with federal officials tonight in North Bend at the first of four public hearings across southern Oregon.

The meeting will take public comment on the draft environmental impact statement prepared by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which has siting authority for LNG terminals.

FERC issued the draft EIS at the end of August, nearly a year after Jordan Cove Energy Project and Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline Project filed their applications.

The deadline for all public comments on the report is Dec. 4, though McCaffree, leader of the local Citizens Against LNG group, wants it extended.

She thinks some landowners haven’t been adequately informed about possible alternative pipeline routes, including one that travels up Haynes Inlet before heading south. When Pacific Connector filed its application last year, its preferred route went under Coos Bay.

“Those people affected by the new route deserve every bit of scrutiny as the bay route got,” McCaffree said. “The process should be done right and I don’t think they are doing it right.”

Barton, president of Friends of New and Sustainable Industry, has mailed a letter to FERC with his comments on the draft EIS. He said it is quite possible he will share some of them tonight.

His letter focuses on the value of building an LNG terminal on Coos Bay while downplaying its safety risks and impacts on air and ship travel. He points out that he believes having an LNG terminal in Coos Bay will help ensure dredge funding for the shipping channel and entice new investment on the North Spit.

“This may perhaps be the biggest long term benefit of all,” he wrote.

Tim Bishop, a founding member of Friends of LNG, echoed those sentiments.

“This area needs to build its own economy,” he said. “The LNG terminal will become our anchor tenant and allow for further new business development on the North Spit.”

Steve Jones, director of Coos Riverkeeper, a group that seeks to protect the local watershed, has a different opinion on FERC’s focus. Instead of looking at how to improve the local economy, FERC’s mandate is to consider alternatives to building the Jordan Cove terminal, like piping natural gas from Wyoming. Jones said he doesn’t believe FERC has thoroughly investigated alternative ways to provide energy to Oregon.

“The draft EIS had its conclusion and then (FERC) built the case around it,” he said.

The report’s lack of information about alternative energy sources will give opponents an easy path to hold up the project, Jones said.

“The way it is written, it will be tied up in litigation for years.”