A message and call for help from Kari Matsko of NEOGAP:
For the last 3-4 years it has been only NEOGAP (still growing) trying to get Ohio lawmakers and landowners properly informed. Ohio seems to be constantly ignored and this is dangerous for all nearby states because:
-we are second only to TX in air pollution
-we have the 4th highest number of wells drilled in the nation (after TX, PA, OK)
-most in ohio are clueless and think these problems are just in PA or NY, no one is educated!
-we will take any/all waste into our injection wells without testing
-we just passed a law saying brine includes fracking fluid and anything else
-our drilling borders lake erie and all the tributaries
-drillers/well owners have come forward saying companies dump cuttings/fluids into storm drains, rivers & ravines
-we have ZERO ft setbacks to water sources/watersheds etc
-we have NO marcellus shale special permit conditions, despite many being drilled
-our state disallows local mayors/officials to mandate drilling locations (zoning nixed)
-our state disallows epa, soil & water etc to implement environmental provisions
-our state regulators work with drillers to compose 20 acre tracts made up of numerous small highly residential lots & then place drill operations within 150 ft of homes/schools
-our state requires no NORM/TENORM, H2S or any other air monitoring despite these close conditions
-our state works with drillers to ensure enough land is pooled by sending letters to home owners stating their minerals will be taken by force if they don't sign leases
-people are selling (trying to sell) after being poisoned by H2S, CO, or had their water contaminated...things are so bad, most are saying they are looking to move outside OH
-we really have no enforcement, after the bainbridge explosion (similar to Dimock)- no company was fined...this rarely to never happens & the air poisonings above were considered 'legal' by our regulators
-our governor is NOT LISTENING, they all only listen to the 'experts' the regulators/enforcers in OH (!!) -he's had letters pour in since 2004 and still signed a bad bill last week because our regulators supported it (with the oil and gas lobby)
PLEASE- our people are:
scooping oil off their drinking water glass before consuming from the tap,
tap water lights on fire,
getting rashes from bathing,
opening windows to prevent homes from exploding,
getting tasered on our own land when it holds gas/oil operations we object to,
taking kids out of school,
camping to avoid sleeping in homes near compressor stations (air,noise problems)
THANKS for any help you can provide!
Kari Matsko
Director, NEOGAP - Ohio
440-579-5314
http://www.neogap.org/
DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY!
2 comments:
This poor community. It sounds like another notch on the belt of the gas company signifying the taking over of a once-beautiful place and leaving a polluted wasteland when they're done. I wish that politicians would realize that, eventually, this environmental devastation WILL filter down to THEIR grandmother's houses; to THEIR children's houses; to THEIR houses. They don't seem to get it.
What we have is a group of politicians and industry disabling protections for citizens and should be charged under the RICO laws of the United States. However, nobody will act unless we start to get more people involved against these illegal acts. If this happened in a third world country, the United Nations would boycott that country for charges of official oppression. Oppression works in concert with silence and that is why it has begun to takeover. If you haven't notice most of these sites for gas drilling are on some of the most independent fertile farmlands? This is also about consolidating agriculture and destroying food and water resources. Thus increases peak water, peak soil, and peak oil. If you track who's making the largest bets in commodities speculation, you'll find their hands have been in the hydraulic fracturing speculations too. This is why the liquid gas is being sent for market pricing and consumption.
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