If you would like to have your voice heard on the issue of gas drilling in Dallas, now is your opportunity to speak before the City of Dallas’ Gas Drilling Taskforce:
Tuesday, August 2
7pm
Dallas City Hall
1500 Marilla St.
L1 Conference Room (the sub-level near the parking garage)
You don’t have to sign up beforehand to speak, so please plan to attend!
Yesterday, the Dallas City Council approved the members of the city’s gas drilling taskforce, which will evaluate the environmental and safety concerns related to urban gas drilling and craft an ordinance to recommend to the Council.
Six months ago, it didn’t look like we were going to get a taskforce. Luckily, after some discussion and persuasion, the Council agreed that a taskforce was necessary. So after debate, we agreed on the composition:
The selection committee was chaired by Linda Koop and included councilmembers Neumann, Natinsky, Medrano, Davis, Kadane, Margolin, and me.
Councilmember Koop did a great job ensuring the application and selection process was open and transparent — posting the application online and encouraging the public to apply (as opposed to a closed process where interviewees had to be nominated by councilmembers).
A little over a month ago, we had an open call for applications. After receiving 68 applications, we narrowed down the field to 18 interviews. At the request of then-councilmember-elect Scott Griggs and Councilmember Delia Jasso, we added John McCall, an Oak Cliff resident, to the list of interviewees, making it 19.
After interviewing everyone, each councilmember voted for their nine picks, and that was tallied to get the nine taskforce members. There was a tie for one of the environmental/citizen positions (Louis McBee and John McCall), and at Scott Griggs’ request we selected John McCall.
Finally, the council had to vote to approve the taskforce. The vote was originally scheduled for our last voting meeting of the council term (last week), but at the request of then-councilmember-elect Scott Griggs, we moved the vote to our Inaugural meeting so that he could participate.
Yesterday the Council voted to approve the recommendation of the selection committee.
Councilmember Griggs had proposed adding a person from the Mountain Creek area since it is most affected by this issue due to its place above the Barnett Shale natural gas formation.
I agree with that sentiment, and wish it had been made earlier in the process so they could have been included in our original 9-member selection rather than added as a proposed 10th at the end. Unfortunately, there were not enough votes on the council to add only one person. If we had added another citizen/environmentalist, the majority of the council also wanted to add another industry representative (“for balance”). The selected taskforce is very well-balanced and isn’t too industry-heavy, and if we began deviating from the selection process that the council had agreed on for several months, we risked a pro-industry taskforce.
In the end, I’m very pleased with the members on the taskforce. They are:
SUBJECT MATTER EXPERTS
BUSINESS AND INDUSTRY REPS
ENVIRONMENTALISTS/CITIZENS
If you are interested in helping shape Dallas’ policies and regulations regarding gas drilling, please apply to serve on the city’s gas drilling taskforce. Here’s the info from City Hall:
The City of Dallas is seeking individuals to serve on the Dallas Gas Drilling Task Force, which will propose revisions to the City’s gas drilling ordinance. Applicants are needed for the following positions:
- Three experts in environmental impact studies, air quality, water quality, and/or soil contamination issues in relation to oil and gas drilling. Examples include professors, environmental attorneys, environmental consultants and land use/zoning attorneys
- Three industry/business representatives. Examples include gas drilling company representatives with a presence in the Barnett Shale and/or persons who have implemented “best practices”, such as oil and gas attorneys
- Three citizens and/or environmental group representatives
Task force applicants must be willing to meet on at least eight Tuesday afternoons from 2:00 to 4:00 from July through October. Two meetings will include public hearings that may be in the evening hours.
You can fill out the application online, and it’s due by 5 p.m. Monday, May 23. The council will interview potential candidates in early June.
I am proud to announce that I just received the endorsement of two important environmental groups here in Dallas! The Dallas Sierra Club and Dallas Area Residents for Responsible Drilling:
Known to many as probably the smartest member of the city council, she has continued to ask the right questions and taken stands where others were too nervous or watching the polling stats to do so.
…In the final analysis, we need more leaders in city hall like Angela Hunt who are willing to ask the hard, intelligent questions and not to be afraid of losing votes from the residents or financial support from those outside of their districts.
…We applaud her ‘no guts no glory’ approach to civic government and look forward to having her on the city council for another term. [Read more…]
Many thanks to both Dallas Sierra Club and DARRD for their recognition of my commitment to our environment!
After working on this issue for several months, I am proud to report that yesterday the Dallas City Council unanimously approved the creation of a gas drilling taskforce.
In February, I sent a memo to my colleagues proposing that we create a taskforce to revise Dallas’ gas drilling ordinance to ensure our residents and environment are protected from any dangers that may be posed by urban gas drilling. I worked with several councilmembers to get this important issue in front of the council yesterday, and the entire council embraced the idea.
I am pleased that we were able to achieve overwhelming consensus on this issue and thank my colleagues for their support!
The Dallas Morning News has an editorial in today’s paper supporting the formation of a City of Dallas gas drilling taskforce:
Dallas residents should take special note of a City Council briefing Wednesday about hydraulic fracturing — a process used to recover natural gas — and its potential effects on public health, the environment and property values. This briefing sets the stage for an important council decision on how to proceed with requests by at least two production companies to initiate drilling near homes and businesses in Dallas.
….Key to Wednesday’s briefing is a proposal to establish a task force, composed of industry representatives, citizens and experts, to review available data about hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking” and produce recommendations on next steps. Not only should the council approve the task force’s formation, but it should also hold off on issuing drilling permits until the task force has performed its work.
….Council members Angela Hunt and Linda Koop, along with the city staff, deserve a lot of credit for getting the task force effort rolling and making sure it receives the council’s full attention.
In late February, I outlined to my council colleagues a proposal to create a gas drilling taskforce that would evaluate the environmental, health, and safety effects of gas drilling and propose changes to Dallas’ gas drilling ordinance. Today, Councilman Neumann and I sent a joint letter to our council colleagues encouraging them to support such a taskforce, among several alternatives to be considered by the council on Wednesday.
The taskforce is largely as I had proposed with some minor changes: It will include three oil & gas experts instead of two, three environmentalists/residents (same as proposed), and three industry representatives OR business representatives (regional chamber/oil & gas attorneys/etc.) instead of a single oil & gas industry rep. The taskforce will include non-voting members from the regional EPA and TCEQ, as well as a representative from the Park Board (the city’s gas lease includes parkland).
It was important that the selection process be open and transparent, so we have proposed a public application process (anyone may apply) and any councilmember who requests to serve on the selection committee may do so.
This is a critical first step in ensuring Dallas citizens and our environment are protected from any risks posed by the gas drilling process and I am hopeful that my colleagues will support this effort.
You can review our letter to the council as well as’ city staff’s council briefing.
In this week’s Dallas Observer, Jim Schutze has an excellent article about gas drilling in Dallas and the need for a citizen taskforce: “Maybe City Council Should Have Asked Some Questions Before Taking Drillers’ Money.”
An excerpt:
In 2008 the city council voted to award gas drilling leases on city-owned land to two energy companies.
Wait. Let me go over this again.
This is before the city knows squat about hydraulic fracturing or fracking, as the drilling technique in this area is called. This is before they even devise a safety plan of any kind to deal with fires, explosions or toxic releases. This is before they even raise the question of whether fracking should be allowed inside the city on private land. They sell leases to two big energy companies to allow fracking on city-owned land.
A single council member—Hunt—voted against the leases. She told the rest of the council at the time she thought it was crazy to bind the city to this kind of obligation without doing an ounce of research.
Hunt, a lawyer, warned them it was going to come back to bite them. Why would they sign a contract obligating the city to allow gas drilling in and near neighborhoods when the council had never explored or even considered the issue of safety?
So guess where we are now. The city has accepted $30 million for the leases from those two energy companies. Now the companies want to drill. They are seeking permits for wells near neighborhoods in far west and far southwest Dallas.
…..
What Hunt has proposed and the city council will vote on next month is a task force to look at the issues and recommend changes to the city’s drilling ordinance. Those changes might include any number of things that would reinforce public safety without denying the energy companies the right to exercise their leases.
…..
I asked Hunt what her goals would be for the task force she has proposed. “First and foremost,” she said, “it’s to protect our neighborhoods. We need to take a step back, and we need to look at the environmental issues associated with fracking. What is the current science on the safety of fracking? And go from there.”
She does make sense. But that is also why she is often in the minority on our current city council.
Cities across the country have been struggling to address the health, safety and environmental issues associated with a new gas drilling technique known as hydro-fracking, where large volumes of pressurized water, sand, and chemicals are injected deep into the ground to release natural gas trapped in rock.
Last month, the Dallas City Council agreed to delay a drilling permit vote until a city-appointed taskforce could review and revise the city’s drilling ordinance. However, a taskforce proposal has not been forthcoming, and concerned residents have regularly voiced their frustration to the City Council about this delay.
Creating a gas drilling taskforce is a critical first step in evaluating the hazards that may be posed by hydro-fracking. Just today, The New York Times issued a troubling report:
With hydrofracking, a well can produce over a million gallons of wastewater that is often laced with highly corrosive salts, carcinogens like benzene and radioactive elements like radium, all of which can occur naturally thousands of feet underground. Other carcinogenic materials can be added to the wastewater by the chemicals used in the hydrofracking itself.
While the existence of the toxic wastes has been reported, thousands of internal documents obtained by The New York Times from the Environmental Protection Agency, state regulators and drillers show that the dangers to the environment and health are greater than previously understood.
The documents reveal that the wastewater, which is sometimes hauled to sewage plants not designed to treat it and then discharged into rivers that supply drinking water, contains radioactivity at levels higher than previously known, and far higher than the level that federal regulators say is safe for these treatment plants to handle.
Given the growing evidence of risks associated with hydro-fracking, the Dallas City Council must move swiftly to address the safety of this practice. To move this issue forward, last week I proposed to my colleagues the formation of a Gas Drilling Taskforce, outlining its composition and responsibilities based on best practices and lessons learned from other North Texas cities. Among other things, the Gas Drilling Taskforce will be responsible for proposing revisions to the city’s gas drilling ordinance and forwarding their recommendations to the Dallas City Council.
The health and welfare of Dallas residents is paramount. Since time is short (the vote on one gas drilling permit has been reset for October), I will be working with my colleagues to implement the Gas Drilling Taskforce as quickly as possible.
Last night, I attended a meeting of the Flower Mound Oil and Gas Board of Appeals. One of the two public hearings of the evening involved a request by Keystone Exploration for variances for a hydraulic fracturing gas well just 220 feet from Lake Grapevine, one of the lakes Dallas uses for drinking water. I went to speak against the request.
The meeting started at 6:30 p.m. with the other public hearing item up first (a request by another drilling company for a variance to drill within 1000 feet of a school). The five member panel (with one alternate) asked excellent questions and were very engaged. One thing that I found troubling about the company’s presentation was that their attorney kept threatening to sue the city and the panel members individually if the city didn’t grant their variance.
When the hearing was opened to public comment, many residents voiced their opposition with the proposed variance and dismay with the intimidation tactics. Opposition representatives put on a very persuasive Powerpoint. One very thoughtful gentleman even proposed the panel go into closed session to get advice from their attorney due to the company’s threats of litigation. Interestingly, the panel did so, then returned.
One board member moved to approve the variance, and I was disheartened, but then no one seconded the motion, so I thought it had died for lack of a second. Nope, another member seconded it. It seemed to me the panel had been cowed by the threats of a lawsuit. But wait — then the chair called the question, and each board member one by one voted “no.” I guess it was some parliamentary procedural rule that requires them to make a motion to approve, then vote it down. I don’t really know, but given the facts laid out at the hearing, I think they made the right call.
Our public hearing didn’t start until around 10 p.m. or so. During Keystone’s presentation, they requested numerous variances, not the least of which was one to let them drill within 500 feet of a lake. They claimed they would take safety precautions to make sure the chemicals used in the fracking process weren’t leaked into Lake Grapevine (220 feet away from the drill site, with land sloping towards the lake).
I had a chance to speak around 11:15 p.m., and I spent my three minutes urging the panel to deny Keystone’s variance request. (At my request, the Dallas Water Utility also sent a letter to the board cautioning against granting the variance.)
I pointed out that Dallas uses Lake Grapevine for drinking water, and provides water to 23 suburbs, including the Town of Flower Mound. (The city of Grapevine and the Park Cities water utility use also use the lake.) While I appreciated that the fact that the company profiting from the gas drilling claimed they’d put in place various safety measures, there have been too many incidents across the country where fracking has contaminated drinking water. Numerous levels of government are currently studying the safety of fracking — all the way from the EPA (whose study is to be completed in 2012) to several states, as well as local municipalities like Fort Worth. So there is no assurance that the measures the company proposed will indeed be sufficient to protect Lake Grapevine. Water in North Texas is too precious a resource to risk contamination. I left around 11:30 p.m. and the meeting was still going on, with opponents stepping up to the mic.
This morning I was pleased to learn that the board unanimously denied the variance, noting that they were uncomfortable with the site’s close proximity to the lake and didn’t believe the proposed berm was enough to prevent floodwaters from carrying chemicals to the lake. Thank you, Flower Mound!
ANGELA HUNT 