From: Karen Dwyer [mailto:dwyerka@xxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Friday, September 18, 2015 10:31 AM
To: Jeff Goldings <jeffrey.goldings@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: SAVE FLORIDA FROM FRACKING
STONECRAB ALLIANCE
15937 Delasol Lane . Naples, FL 34110 . tel 239.404.2171.email
<mailto:dwyerka@xxxxxxxxx> dwyerka@xxxxxxxxx . Stonecrab Alliance @ Facebook
WE NEED YOUR HELP!
It's critical to join us in visible support of anti-fracking legislation in
the county that was fracked. Please come and please share this invite.
Thank you for your help; you're the best and we're very grateful-Karen and
John Dwyer
IT'S NOT OVERY YET: URGE COLLIER COUNTY TO REJECT RICHTER'S PRO-FRACKING
BILL, LOBBY FOR STRONGER LEGISLATION, and ADOPT LOCAL RESOLUTIONS TO PROTECT
PUBLIC FROM FRACKING
Tuesday, September 22, 9:00 a.m.
Collier County Commission Meeting, Bldg. F, 3rd Floor, Collier County
Government Center, 3299 Tamiami Trail E., Naples, FL 34112
Facebook Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1681600525391818/
URGENT ACTION. We need you! Join us at the Board of Collier County
Commissioners' meeting Tuesday, September 22, 9 am at the Collier County
Commission Boardroom to support anti-fracking legislation. The County will
be discussing and approving their Legislative Priorities, including their
top priority, Inland Oil Drilling and Fracking, during agenda item 11.A.
Recommended strategy. Arrive at 9:00 am or soon thereafter. Sign up to
speak during Agenda Item 11.A. Remain until you speak. Come prepared with a
2 or 3 minute speech. TOPIC: Inland Oil Drilling and Fracking
TALKING POINTS.
1) Urge the Commission to reject Senator Richter's pro-fracking bill
because it would cause more harm than good. It does not represent
community concerns and would not even regulate the unauthorized fracking
that occurred at the Hogan well. It is not the strong oil and gas
legislation we were promised. Quite the opposite. The bill would continue
to allow fracking and the non-disclosure of toxic chemicals. Worse yet, it
would PREEMPT local municipalities from protecting themselves with fracking
bans and buffer zones, essentially taking away a county's home rule right to
determine well siting and water use and everything else DEP oil and gas laws
fail to address. Presently counties have the ability to safeguard public
safety, community character, and quality of life by limiting drilling and
well stimulation in inappropriate areas because of zoning issues and
incompatible land use. These powers exist and have been successfully
exercised by Bonita Springs and Broward County, to name just two. To
endorse a bill that would strip local governments of their home rule right
to protect public safety is not in the public interest. It is a betrayal of
the worst kind. We must fight tooth and nail to maintain our home rule
right to place additional restrictions on oil and gas activities. We know
drilling may strain local water supplies, increase truck traffic, adversely
impact local roads, produce excessive noise and pollution, result in
reduction of property values, and disturb residents. Only local government
can address these issues, not DEP. The crucial point is that we don't want
the state preempting our local home rule right to protect public safety.
Reject Richter's bill because it decreases safeguards and would allow
industry to frack Florida as expeditiously and profitably as possible.
2) If the County still seeks to secure stronger state oil and gas laws,
they should echo the concerns of their constituents and lobby for
regulations that would
1) ban all well stimulation, including fracking (because all involve the
injection of toxic chemicals that pose a risk to drinking water);
2) require the use of alternative water supplies as opposed to prime
drinking water (because drilling destroys millions of gallons of water that
is permanently removed from drinking water supplies);
3) establish one mile buffers from residential areas, schools, and
environmentally sensitive lands (so no one has to live in an emergency
evacuation zone);
4) mandate plugging of abandoned boreholes and other potential pathways
for contamination prior to permitting (because hundreds of improperly
plugged and abandoned wells from the 1940s provide pathways for injected
fluids to migrate into water supplies);
5) continue to allow counties to place additional restrictions on oil and
gas activities (because drilling may strain local water supplies, increase
truck traffic, adversely impact local roads, produce excessive noise and
pollution, result in reduction of property values, and disturb residents);
6) require chemical information be disclosed to the public on a
state-maintained database;
7) secure DEP real enforcement power (so they can have unimpeded access to
drill sites); and,
8) levy penalties strong enough to deter.
In short, we want well stimulation banned and conventional oil drilling more
rigorously regulated.
3) Adopt a local resolution to ban all well stimulation, including
fracking-especially now since no meaningful state legislation is being put
forward to protect public safety. The County must work to strengthen local
regulations including securing a one mile buffer zone or setback from drill
site to home, school, and environmentally sensitive lands-one mile so that
residents are moved outside the emergency evacuation zone which is different
in Florida than in other places like Colorado because of our hydrogen
sulfide layer. Now is also the time to pass a resolution to support a
statewide ban on fracking, like the bill submitted by our legislative
delegate, Senator Bullard.
Senator Richter's bill:
http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Documents/loaddoc.aspx?FileName=_s031
8__.DOCX
<http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Documents/loaddoc.aspx?FileName=_s03
18__.DOCX&DocumentType=Bill&BillNumber=0318&Session=2016>
&DocumentType=Bill&BillNumber=0318&Session=2016
