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Direct Action Training!

We’re getting ready! Save the date, there will be direct action trainings on February 9th around the state. Details to come.

Shaleshock 101 – Organizing Against Fracking

Shaleshock 101 training – Organizing Against Fracking

We’re getting ready, and this workshop is catch up for anyone who would like to learn more about the Shaleshock model & the movement against fracking. Come learn some strategy & organizing tools, and get informed about upcoming trainings and actions to protect our community & environment from exploitative industries.

Sunday, February 3rd
2:00pm — 4:00pm
 
at the First Unitarian Society of Ithaca Annex:
 
208 E. Buffalo Street, Ithaca, NY 14850
 
Sponsored by the Tompkins County Health Care Task Force & the Social Justice Committee of the Unitarian Church.
 
 

We WILL take action to defend our communities.

Citizens' Community Forum on Hydro-Fracking

Citizens’ Community Forum on Hydro-Fracking (Media Release)

Wednesday        February 10, 2010     7:00 – 9:00pm

Nottingham High School

3100 East Genesee St.

Syracuse, New York

Over 12,000 citizens and organizations wrote comments on the dSGEIS to NYS DEC.

Untallied thousands wrote letters, made phone calls and signed petitions to NYS DEC, Governor David Paterson and government representatives opposing hydro-fracking.

There were no formal DEC Public Hearings on the dSGEIS in Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo and Utica.

Hundreds of farmers and other land owners have leased their land to gas companies without being informed of the use of hydro-fracking technology and its severe consequences.

There is a growing grassroots movement across NYS and the nation to ban hydro-fracking.

Within this context, citizens are creating a Citizens Community Forum on Hydro-Fracking.

We have invited a variety of local through federal representatives.

Confirmed Participants (as of January 27th) are:

· Lee Macbeth, Syracuse Watershed Control Coordinator

· Ken Lynch, Region 7 DEC Director

· Dave Valesky, State Senator

· Mark Dunnau, Northeast Organic Farmers Association and Delaware County Farm Bureau

· Local landowners who have signed leases

We are awaiting confirmation from Region 2 EPA, Governor Paterson, State Senator Antoine Thompson and Congressman Dan Maffei.

Representatives will open the event with brief comments.  Then there will be time for citizens to voice their concerns.

Concerns will go under the following categories:

· Environmental concerns

· Human Health concerns

· Fossil Fuel versus green, sustainable energy concerns

· Climate Change concerns

· Economic concerns

· Rural, agricultural concerns

Contacts:

Stacey Smith   315-470-0778

Leyana Dessauer 315-470-0778

HEALTH RISKS FORUM – Feb 23rd

NATURAL GAS WITH UN-NATURAL CONSEQUENCES:

THE HEALTH RISKS OF SHALE GAS DRILLING

Tuesday, February 23, 6:30-8:30 at The Forum room, Tompkins Cortland Community College (TC3), 170 North St, Dryden, NY.
The presenters will be Ron Bishop, lecturer in Chemistry at SUNY Oneonta; Thomas Shelly, chemical safety and hazardous materials specialist; Adam Law, a physician who specializes in endocrinology. Dr. William Klepack, a family practice physician in Dryden, will be introducing the speakers.

Doors will open at 6:00 and talks start at 6:30. The evening will be divided into three half hour presentations, with a question and answer period following the presentations.
The presentations:

Ron Bishop, lecturer in chemistry at SUNY Oneonta, will offer a powerpoint presentation addressing the why and how of the unconventional gas drilling technique known as high-volume, slick-water, hydrofracturing. Bishop holds a B.A. in Chemistry from Youngstown State University and a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from The West Virgina University School of Medicine. In his 17 years of full-time research, his projects were related to cancer and biosafety. For the last 11 years, Bishop has taught a variety of courses (biology, genetics, general and organic chemistry, biochemistry and environmental sciences) in high schools and colleges. He currently teaches in the Chemistry & Biochemistry Department at SUNY Oneonta, and is nationally certified in chemical hazards management.
Thomas Shelley, chemical safety and hazardous materials specialist and chemist by profession!,will follow Ron Bishop s presentation with a discussion of how the chemicals used at the drilling site are handled, what chemicals come back out of the ground with the drilling waste fluids and the categories of different chemical mixtures. He will also talk about the established links between chemicals and health, and address some of the issues of radioactivity in the waste fluid. Shelley worked in Cornell Environmental Health and Safety for 18 years as a chemical and laboratory safety specialist. For much of that time he was the Chemical Hygiene Officer for Cornell University.
Adam Law is a physician who specializes in endocrinology. He will present a brief overview of the disruptions chemicals can bring to the human body s endocrine system. Adam Law was raised in London, UK where he received his medical degree and his doctorate in molecular medicine. He has 8 years of basic science research experience in molecular biology and biochemistry. He has been an attending physician at the Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca since 1994 and was President of the medical staff 2009. He became aware of gas drilling in the Finger Lakes portion of the Marcellus shale after questions from his concerned patients. As an endocrinologist he has been inspired by the work of Dr. Theo Colborn, founder of the Endocrine Disruptor Exchange.

This forum is sponsored by Shaleshock Citizen s Action Alliance and co-sponsored by the
Center for Transformative Action, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County, Gas Drilling Awareness of Cortland County, TC3 Sustainability Council, Dryden R
esource Awareness Coalition, Sustainable Otsego, Sustainable Tompkins, and Marcellus Accountability Project.

For more information contact Shaleshock08@yahoo.com or call Sharon Anderson, Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County at 607-272-2292

PLEASE HELP DISTRIBUTE AND DISPLAY POSTERS!

TC3 health 2-23 risks flyer

Marcellus Challenge Pledge-In

Join Sustainable Tompkins for an evening to learn from local energy experts how you can reduce your energy footprint through conservation, efficiency measures, and investments in renewable energy. Then, learn about and take the Marcellus Challenge.

March 3, 2010 from 6pm to 8pm
Women’s Community Building, Seneca St., Ithaca, NY

Ithaca Area Poets February Challenge: Marcellus

Ithaca Area Poets writes,

I noticed a theme is on many hearts and minds right now – concerns about hydrofracking in Marcellus shale.

SO, next month (February 12th, 7pm) bring your poem or poems about Fracking (and Marcellus region and clean water)! I am going to try to organize prizes for participants, and possibly we’ll videotape the readings to help with the movement for clean water. If you’re too shy to read them on camera or you can’t come, send them to me ahead of time and someone else will read them for you (please tell me if you want us to say your name or you want to be anonymous)! Also, if you’re willing to bring print copies for me, that would be super. Thanks!

Click here for more info.

LISTEN: Capitol Connection Program on Marcellus Shale

Check out episode #949 of The Capitol Connection on WAMC Northeast Public Radio: “Host Alan Chartock is joined by WAMC Hudson Valley bureau chief Susan Barnett, who analyzes the ongoing fight over the proposed Marcellus Shale Formation drilling. They also discuss the political implications of any decisions on the drilling.”
Click here to listen