Slight change to Dakota Access pipeline comment meeting format, Army Corps says after complaints

BISMARCK, N.D. — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, in the wake of complaints, changed the format of oral testimony for public comments on a draft environmental review of the controversial Dakota Access oil pipeline. The Corps held two meetings in Bismarck, on Wednesday and Thursday, for public comments on the document that will help determine whether the federal government grants the easement for the pipeline’s crossing under the Missouri River near the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s reservation. Pipeline opponents had criticized the Wednesday meeting because oral testimony was only accepted in private to stenographers in a curtained area in a hotel ballroom. The slight change in the meeting format was due to a smaller public turnout; only 20 people had signed up to make oral comments at Thursday’s meeting, Corps spokesman Steve Wolf told The Associated Press.