Country: USA
Author: Dan Wiessner
A lawsuit challenging a small town's ban on natural-gas drilling could have implications throughout New York, where state officials are poised to approve a controversial drilling method known as fracking.
Anschutz Exploration Corporation filed suit on Friday against Dryden, a rural suburb of Ithaca with about 13,000 residents that last month amended its zoning laws to bar all gas drilling within its unincorporated borders.New York's Department of Environmental Conservation has recommended ending a year-long ban on drilling in New York, although a public comment period on the rules was extended this month following concerns that fracking contaminates underground wells and aquifers.
The Anschutz suit, which asks the state Supreme Court in Tompkins County to invalidate the amendment, is the first to test the legal implications of the state's move.
Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, involves cracking open rocks deep underground with a blast of sand, water and chemicals to unleash natural gas and oil.
Anschutz, which owns more than 22,000 acres of land in Dryden, said New York's Environmental Conservation Law bars local governments from any regulation of drilling.
Officials in Dryden and other towns considering their own restrictions on gas extraction say the law prohibits them only from regulating the drilling itself and not from saying where or whether it can take place.
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Help, I live in this town. The town is awesome, but we are being sued by this big gas company less than 2 months before our Town Board Election. A town board that voted unanimously to Ban Fracking. Now, 3 of the 5 members of the TB are up for re-election. Running against some serious pro-frackers.
ReplyDeletePlease help us. We are a small town with small resources. Our activist group, DRAC, is making signs, advertising, etc, but our website sucks: http://draconline.wordpress.com/.
We need help. Anything. You can contact me directly: http://rickateecontact.blogspot.com/
We are trying to set up concerts, rallies, anything! but we need some love. send it our way.
Dont let big, dirty corporations dictate how we run our small towns!
Thanks,
Rick
I lived thru the 60's and can't help but draw comparison
ReplyDeleteto the spoiled, bored, PC, somewhat educated, and
gutless protesters who are a movement desperately
trying to manufacture a cause. Frack is an easily
recognized and remembered buzzword suitable for
bumper stickers and soundbites. Sorta like "Assault
Weapon," it just rolls on the tongue. Right out of the
Goebel NAZI propaganda user manual. As with anything
controversial, a creative mind can find a way to make
money, nay, even a good living, off the donations that
can be frightened out of the ignorant masses, most of
whom do not own land, pay taxes or vote. Get a real
job. As of Oct 7, 2011 there are seven billion people
on the earth. They all want to have what you have in
the US. Worry about that.