Sep. 25--KEYSER, W.Va. -- All but one of the 23 people who spoke Thursday afternoon during a public hearing favored the Pinnacle Wind Farm atop Green Mountain.

U.S. Wind Force has applied to the West Virginia Public Service Commission for permission to construct up to 23 wind turbines on property owned in part by NewPage Corp., a major employer in the area with nearly 1,000 workers, and private landowners.

Union millwrights, iron workers and construction workers sitting in a packed Mineral County Courthouse on Armstrong Street touted the 150 to 200 temporary jobs as a much-needed boost to the area's economy during a 65-minute hearing, the first of two scheduled for Thursday.

Bryce Hoopengarner, a Mineral County resident and a union worker with Local 1024 in Cumberland, said construction workers are used to the temporary status of all their projects.

"You need to understand," Hoopengarner told PSC Chairman Michael Albert, "this brings jobs."

Hoopengarner listed the many industrial and manufacturing plants that have closed as he grew up in the area, including Kelly- Springfield Tire Co. He also noted the work force size at the NewPage paper mill, which is less than half of what it once was.

"If you don't jump on these windmills, what's next to shut down?" Hoopengarner said. "For something people don't want, we sure are trying to build these fast."

With a comic touch, he relayed a story about his wife banging pots and pans together to encourage a couple of black bears to leave their back yard. Hoopengarner said he told his wife if they weren't fed, they'd leave.

"If you don't feed me, I'm going to leave," Hoopengarner said.

His story supported the region's declining population over the last 30 years. As jobs have dried up and heads of households have lost their ability to feed their families, they, too, have left the area.

Potomac State College biology Professor Paula Piehl said she was concerned that studies noted in U.S. Wind Force's filing with the PSC seemed inadequate. Birds' migratory patterns, she said, were considered only during daytime hours and not for nocturnal species.

"I know I'm going against the grain," Piehl said, but "I'm speaking for the organisms that can't speak for themselves."

Piehl said the area's ridge line is unique along the Allegheny Front.

"You don't find anywhere else like it in the state," she said.

Ridgeley Mayor Richard Lechliter supported the project and said he's been interested in wind energy since visiting an exhibit 27 years ago in Knoxville, Tenn. He also spent some time turbine-watching while in California in the early 1990s.

"They produce good-paying jobs," Lechliter said. "Some are temporary, but a few will be ongoing."

Lechliter said he's visited wind turbines in nearby Tucker County as well as Somerset County, Pa. Both locations have boasted visitors who stop to take pictures.

Coal and natural gas, he said, are a part of the solution towards energy independence from foreign oil.

"I believe wind energy needs to be a part of this," he said.

Daniel DeWitt is an engineer with CME Engineering in Frostburg. He said he's already benefited from wind projects through job-related duties and supports this project.

"In my view, it'd be a mistake to not to carry out this project to completion," DeWitt said.

And there shouldn't be any interference or communications issues. Marc Bashoor, director of Mineral County's Office of Emergency Management, said his office expressed no objection to the project.

The PSC's evidentiary hearing is scheduled to begin Oct. 26 in Charleston.

Contact Kevin Spradlin at kspradlin@times-news.com.

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