“I’m going to stand in front of that gate and say, ‘This is my home, and I’m not letting you drive through that gate,’” Church said on Thursday morning. “And then if they want to arrest me, they can handcuff me and take me to jail or run me over. But this is where I take my stand.”

For months, Church had fought Alabama Power’s effort to use eminent domain to secure access to his property in Alabama’s lower courts, arguing that the utility could easily use alternative routes to build a transmission line that would not be as disruptive to homeowners like himself in rural Shelby County, about a 45-minute drive south of Birmingham. 

In September, that legal battle resulted in a victory for Church when Circuit Court Judge Jonathan Spann issued a temporary injunction preventing Alabama Power from accessing Church’s property. In his ruling, Spann found that Alabama Power, one of the state’s most powerful companies, had failed to follow the necessary procedures for condemnation of Church’s land outlined in state law. 

Church was likely to succeed on the merits of his case, and without a preliminary injunction, he would be irreparably harmed, the judge wrote.

Spann also noted that an Alabama Power employee had testified in court that the route for the planned transmission line crossing Church’s property had been finalized with “no consideration” to zoning plans or the “development potential or suitability” of properties it would cross. 

That unrebutted testimony made it likely that Church would be able to prove that Alabama Power’s siting of the transmission line was illegally arbitrary and capricious, Spann ruled.

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