Three protesters locked themselves to the entrance of the first fracking well to reopen in Denton, Texas, after a city ban on fracking was over-ridden by a state law barring the ban. In this photo, a police sergeant is seen thanking the three protesters and shaking their hands before putting them in handcuffs. (photo: Democracy Now!)
Fracking Protests Continue in Texas as New ALEC-Backed Law Bars Towns From Banning Drilling
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city of Denton, Texas, is in a showdown with Big Oil after it tried to
pass a ban on fracking within its city limits. On Tuesday night,
residents of Denton, about 30 miles north of Dallas-Fort Worth, packed a
city council meeting to oppose a vote to repeal the ban. The vote was
ultimately tabled. The move comes after Texas lawmakers passed a new law
that prohibits such bans. The measure went into effect on Monday. That
same morning, three protesters locked themselves to the entrance of the
first fracking well to reopen. It was just this past November that
nearly 60 percent of Denton residents supported the ban at the ballot
box. But they were immediately threatened with lawsuits by the Texas Oil
and Gas Association and the Texas General Land Office. Those same
interests worked with lawmakers and the American Legislative Exchange
Council, or ALEC, to pass this new ban on fracking bans known as House
Bill 40. All of this comes as Oklahoma became the second state to ban
fracking bans on Friday. Meanwhile, Maryland became the second state,
after New York, to ban fracking. We are joined by Tara Linn Hunter,
volunteer coordinator for Frack Free Denton.
Transcript
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: "The Death of Democracy"
by The Frackettes. The lead singer is our next guest. This is Democracy
Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with
Juan González.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, we turn now to
Texas, where a small town finds itself in a showdown with Big Oil after
it tried to pass a ban on fracking within its city limits. On Tuesday
night, residents of Denton, about 30 miles north of Dallas-Fort Worth,
packed a city council meeting to oppose a vote to repeal the ban. The
vote was ultimately tabled. The move comes after Texas lawmakers passed a
new law that prohibits such bans. The measure went into effect on
Monday. That same morning, three protesters locked themselves to the
entrance of the first fracking well to reopen. A police sergeant thanked
the three and shook their hands before putting them in handcuffs.
AMY GOODMAN: It was just this past
November that nearly 60 percent of Denton, Texas, residents supported
the ban at the ballot box. But they were immediately threatened with
lawsuits by the Texas Oil and Gas Association and the Texas General Land
Office. Those same interests worked with lawmakers and the American
Legislative Exchange Council, known as ALEC, to pass this new ban on
fracking bans known as House Bill 40. Now residents could consider their
own legal tactics. They are represented by the same lawyer who
successfully defended a constitutional challenge to a fracking ban in
Dryden, New York. All of this comes as Oklahoma became the second state
to ban fracking bans on Friday. Meanwhile, Maryland became the second
state, after New York, to ban fracking.
Well, for more, we go to Fort Worth, Texas, where
we’re joined by Tara Linn Hunter, volunteer coordinator for Frack Free
Denton. She was one of three people arrested Monday. Another three were
arrested Tuesday.
Welcome to Democracy Now!, Tara. So, explain where Denton stands right now.
TARA LINN HUNTER: Well, right now,
what we’re seeing is that our vote has been disregarded and overturned
with the passage of House Bill 40. So that nullifies our ban and makes
it unenforceable. And what we’re seeing now is that residents are
willing to go out every morning to the frack site and put themselves on
the line to enforce their ordinance and make the vote of the people
heard.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And the lawmakers can even make this ban on the ban retroactive?
TARA LINN HUNTER: Yes, that’s right.
Our ban was completely legal. We went through the citizens’ initiative
process to get that on the ballot. It’s a petition process. We only
needed 500 signatures; we got 2,000. And we put it to a vote to the
people of Denton. And they overwhelmingly voted to ban fracking. So it
was a completely legal process that we followed. And then, they passed
House Bill 40. They basically had to go change the law in order to beat
us. So...
AMY GOODMAN: Tara Linn Hunter, before you tell us how you got arrested on Monday, talk about why you got involved with this issue.
TARA LINN HUNTER: Well, I got
involved because I moved to Denton to study music, specifically singing.
We’re known for our music and art in my town. I’m very proud of that.
And while I was there, I developed debilitating adult asthma. So I
started looking into our air quality issues, and I realized that
Denton—the American Lung Association has given Denton an F-quality air.
So I started researching the sources of air pollution, and then I came
across fracking pretty quick.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And the Legislature in
Texas acts even as news has been coming out recently about the huge
increase in earthquakes linked to fracking wells in nearby Oklahoma.
What’s been the public response to this kind of information getting out
throughout Texas?
TARA LINN HUNTER: Sure. People are
very concerned. I attended a town hall meeting in Irving that was
packed. Hundreds and hundreds of people poured out after feeling there
homes shake. There’s injection wells near there. And people are very
concerned and very upset.
AMY GOODMAN: And so, right in Denton
and in its surrounding area, how much fracking is going on? What are the
oil companies involved? Is there any connection to elected officials?
TARA LINN HUNTER: Absolutely. So, in
Denton alone, we have 300 gas wells in our city limits. They’re less
than 250 feet from homes. Some of the neighborhood signs actually wrap
around the walls that surround the frack wells. So this is really—you
know, it’s near our hospitals, our schools, so forth.
Some of the companies that are operating there, one of
them is Vantage. One of them is EagleRidge. EagleRidge was caught
dumping chemicals into Hickory Creek. Just a few weeks ago, Vantage had
one of their wells explode just outside of a neighborhood. That fire
went on for about seven hours. EagleRidge had a blowout near our
airport. Homes were evacuated. That one, the blowout didn’t stop for 14
hours. And we found levels of benzene when we did air samples. So, these
are some of the companies that are operating in our city.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And you’ve said that
your supposed elected officials have sold you out. Could you talk about
those officials and their connection to the oil and gas industry?
TARA LINN HUNTER: Yeah, absolutely.
So, our representative, Myra Crownover, our senator, Craig Estes, really
disregarded their own constituents’ votes and voted for House Bill 40.
The Texas Tribune does a wonderful job of laying out potential conflicts
of interest, and they show, you know, how many of our politicians,
including these two, are really oil-soaked and that they have direct
investment in oil and gas and receive contributions, campaign
contributions, from the oil and gas industry.
AMY GOODMAN: Three days later after
Texas lawmakers voted to prohibit city bans on fracking, lighting struck
a frack well in Denton and set it on fire. Resident Leah Strittmatter
lives near the well and described what she saw.
LEAH STRITTMATTER: I saw, out of our kitchen
window, orange reflecting off of our children’s playset. And I said,
"John, lightning struck somewhere." And I thought lightning had struck
there, our yard or their playhouse. And we ran outside, and the heat
from the immense flames just smacked us in the face. It was so hot. The
flames that were coming off of the compression station was just massive.
I kept trying to call 911 over and over, and nobody would answer. It
kept going to a fast busy signal.
AMY GOODMAN: The well is operated by
Vantage, the same company that opened new fracking sites in Denton this
week after Texas lifted city bans on fracking. Just last month, a
Vantage gas wellhead malfunctioned and began leaking fracking fluid in
nearby Arlington, where dozens of homes were evacuated after the company
took two hours to notify officials of the emergency. In December, the
company agreed to pay a nearly $1 million fine after it violated waste
disposal regulations at one of its oil wells in Franklin Township,
Pennsylvania. So, Tara Linn Hunter, as we wrap up, can you talk about
your arrest on Monday? I mean, presumably, the police come from your
area. The police shook your hand and then handcuffed you?
TARA LINN HUNTER: That’s right. They
were thanking us for our community service as they were arresting us.
And when we got to the station, they let us out on personal
recognizance, you know, saying that we’re not a threat to the community.
I think that they’re very sympathetic to the cause, because if you live
in Denton, you’re aware of the effects of fracking in your daily life.
So I hope that that sympathy continues as we move forward. But it was a
very civil exchange.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And what are your next
steps now, given now that the state Legislature has—and as well as
Oklahoma’s Legislature, has banned the bans on fracking? And what do you
hope to do next?
TARA LINN HUNTER: I think that our
residents are very interested in seeing the city, you know, uphold the
vote of the people. And so, last night we packed a city council meeting
and unanimously requested that they not be the ones to repeal the ban
themselves. So we’re looking at the best strategy moving forward. How
can we fight House Bill 40? On a larger scale, how can we really
tell—continue to tell our powerful narrative of a small Texas town
standing up to a billion-dollar industry? It’s a real David-and-Goliath
story. On the ground, we’re continuing our education efforts to get
people—
AMY GOODMAN: Tara Linn Hunter, we’re
going to have to leave it there. I want to thank you for being with us,
volunteer coordinator for Frack Free Denton, arrested Monday as part of
the protests to stop the first new fracking well since Denton residents
voted to pass a fracking ban last November. And she’s lead singer with
The Frackettes.
Comments
+3
#
2015-06-04 09:20
Big oil would never
suspend the Constitution unless there was profit for them to do the
dirty work. The Texas law makers are not in oil's pocket; bought and
paid for, the governor is not energy's bought and paid lackey, oh no.
0
#
2015-06-04 10:42
Here is a new chapter
for Civics textbooks in Texas, so carefully censored. Local control is a
carefully cultivated myth, one of many BIG LIES (outrageously false,
but pounded in)propagated by GlobalCorp plutocrats, who have CRIMINALLY,
feloniously corrupted our governments far beyond those of foreign
nations we malign. Every day, think about one of those BIG LIES you once
believed, maybe still believe, have loved ones who BELIEVE. Did Denton
voters also PRAY to Jesus that they would be spared from fracking; some
BIG LIES there to reconsider. Obama is determined to see more US public
lands coal mined, arctic regions drilled, Baby, along with the
Continental Shelf. He talks against Climate Change more than Al Gore,
enables it more than Dick Cheney? There is NO Super Hero coming to
rescue US from ecocidal catastrophe. WE must be the change we can
believe in. We have to leave our keyboards for MASSIVE non-violent
ACTIVE PARTICIPATION in the democratic process, as mostly younger
Americans did in the Civil Rights Movement, anti-war movement, women's
movement, etc. Internet whining from locations of no risk comfort just
WILL NOT ACCOMPLISH ANYTHING. ORGANIZE fund raisers(around fun
themes...Texans Against Frickin' Frackin'..),sen d $$,ORGANIZE mass protests,assemb le,ORGANIZE sit-ins, march,ORGANIZE boycotts,rally, ORGANIZE voter participation,O RGANIZE
public events to expose corrupt officials ("How Did You Vote...for
THAT? WHY?" These cannot be done while sitting & whining.
0
#
2015-06-04 11:22
Have the recent flood
waters been assayed to see what chemicals may have been widely
disseminated from fracking wells? It would be a clue to the
"ingredients" they've refused to let the public know.
