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By arimoore, on August 25th, 2009%
Read Ithaca council raises natural gas-drilling concerns by Krisy Gashler:
Raising concerns about drinking water, roads and safety for emergency responders, Ithaca’s Common Council is getting involved in the discussion about gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale.
The majority of the city’s watershed for its Six Mile Creek drinking water source is outside the city in the Towns of Ithaca and Caroline. Roughly 38 percent of the total land area in Tompkins County has already been leased for oil and gas drilling, including 12 percent in the Town of Ithaca and 49 percent in Caroline, according to gas lease deed information compiled by the citizen’s action group Shaleshock.
Common Council Planning Committee Chairwoman Jennifer Dotson, I-1st, said city officials have concerns in four major areas: water use and wastewater disposal; impact on roads and infrastructure; safety, especially for firefighters who may have to respond to fires or accidents at drilling sites; and the tax structure for oil and gas revenue.
The planning committee this week discussed strategies they could use to protect the city, including identifying critical natural areas, adopting road preservation laws, and demanding disclosure of all chemicals in hydro-fracturing (fracking) fluid before considering whether to accept it at the wastewater treatment plant, which discharges into Cayuga Lake. (Read more)
By shirari, on June 19th, 2009%
Action recommendations from Don Barber, Chair Tompkins County Council of Governments, Supervisor Town of Caroline:
June 15, 2009 7 PM
Broome Community College
Natural Gas Drilling and Local Government Responsibility to Protect the Health, Safety, and Well Being of its Citizens
In general local governments need to find ways to insert themselves into a process that the State has written us out of.
Potential action steps:
- Develop overweight vehicle permits and driveway permits to protect your roads and create direct contact/negotiations with the drilling firm.
- Identify and legislate critical environmental areas (CEA) within your municipality. DEC must then perform site specific SEQR review for permit applications which affect these CEA’s
- Contact every State Legislator, Governor Paterson and his Deputy Secretary for the Environment, and the DEC Commissioner that we need:
- Notification of permit applications and permits issued;
- Emergency Services need contact info, hazardous material info, gas fire training;
- Fuel production tax or Severance tax to create proper revenues to local governments – tax revenue to support DEC oversight program
- Contact State Legislators requesting that ECL Section 23-0303 be amended so that local governments become involved agencies for SEQR review. And to support S8748 Natural Gas Drilling Prohibition Near Watershed
- Contact your Congressperson and US Senator to support HR 2766 Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act of 2009.
Signed,
Don Barber
Chair Tompkins County Council of Governments, Supervisor Town of Caroline, 607-539-3395, supervisor@townofcaroline.org
Please Contact:
Pete Grannis, DEC Commissioner
625 Broadway, 14th floor
Albany, NY 12233
petegrannis@gw.dec.state.ny.us
(518)402-8540
Judith Enck, Deputy Sec. for the Environment
State Capital Executive Chambers
Room 245
Albany, NY 12224
judith.enck@chamber.state.ny.us
(518) 473-5442
Governor David A. Paterson
State Capitol
Albany, NY 12224
http://161.11.121.121/govemail
518-474-8390
There was a special TCCOG meeting held at the Ithaca Town Hall on March 30th by Municipal and Environmental Attorney Kimberlea Rea. The white paper for her talk is available by following the gas drilling link on the TCCOG website:
http://www.tompkins-co.org/legislature/TCCOG/
A video of the meeting can be found at http://tompco.net/tccog/gas.html
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About Us Shaleshock is an information hub connecting people to regional groups and projects working to stop exploitative drilling in the Marcellus Shale.(more)
2009 Signs of Sustainability
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