Residents Battle Cry ...

 

"Don't Frack My Fairway"

 

Residents Protest with Drilling Rig at Official Re-Opening of City Golf Course Already Leased For Fracking

 

 

 

Spotlighting what they say is their city's rush to sacrifice park land to heavy industry, Dallas residents supporting a ban on gas drilling in public greenbelts crashed the official re-opening ceremonies on October 26, 2012 at the municipal golf course that City Hall has alaready leased for fracking.

 

Now being renamed "Luna Vista," the former LB Houston Golf Course hosted at least three separate leased drilling sites - including one immediately next to the driving range.  To show golfers how close they'll be to hundreds of trucks, heavy machinery and toxic chemicals, members of the Dallas Residents at Risk alliance set-up a 15-foot tall mock drilling rig immediately next to the club house for the ribbon-cutting.  The prop loomed over the proceedings, attended by City Council and Park and Recreation Board members, as a stark reminder of how the city has already compromised public safety and popular sentiment for the sake of gas leases.

 

Residents voiced concerns that the new Luna Vista Golf Course shows off our natural beauty here in the Trinity River bottomlands, and the proposal to allow a heavy industrial operation like gas drilling in between the river and the driving range is simply unacceptable.  Our park lands are for recreation and relaxation, not fracking and gas extraction.  The last thing this golf course needs is a toxic water hazard and hazardous fumes.

 

Afer two years and a list of task force recommendations, the Dallas City Council is still wrestling with the problems created in 2006 when they took over $30 million from gas operators for leases on city-owned propeerty.  The decision was not publicized and there were no public hearings.  Despite not drilling on those sites in the intervening period, gas operatos are continuing to seek permission to exploit them.  Many of those leases are either in park land like the Luna Vista sites, or in the Trinity River floodplain.  City Councilmember Sheffie Kadane and others have endorsed park drilling, saying the land is underutilized.

 

It's appalling that Councilmember Kadane and others on the Council are seriously considering fracking on thousands of acres of public park lands along the Trinity River with miles of hike and bike trails, a massive new socccer complex, and a municipal golf course in which we've just invested $5 million in renovations.  Our park lands are a generational asset, and our choices today will leave a lasting legacy.



 

Dallas City Council Wants Fracking in Park Land

Citizens Protest Gas Drilling in Dallas Parks By Setting Up
Fracking Rig at White Rock Lake on “It’s My Park Day”

 

New 15-foot “rig” will make appearances at Winfrey Point

and Valley View Park to highlight danger to public spaces

 

What: Citizens show up with new fake fracking rig to protest gas drilling in Dallas parks

Where/When: 1) Winfrey Point, White Rock Lake (Emerald Isle Dr), Saturday October 6^th, 9:00 a.m.

                               2) Valley View Park, 6950 Valley View Lane at Hillcrest, Saturday October 6^th, 11:00 a.m.

 

(Dallas)--- Neighborhood activists will be using a 15-foot model gas drilling rig during this Saturday’s city-sponsored “It’s My Park Day” to spotlight a new city ordinance that could allow drilling in parks for the first time.

 

“It’s ridiculous that while the City is out celebrating our public spaces and trying to recruit residents to help them maintain them, it’s also considering a policy that would allow gas drilling to ruin them,” said Claudia Meyer, of the Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance, a member of the Dallas Residents at Risk coalition sponsoring the action. “We want to give Dallas residents some idea of what it means to have your local park turned into an industrial zone.”

 

Meyer and at least a dozen others will be showing up at White Rock Lake’s Winfrey Point at 9am on Saturday morning with a 15-foot high model of a gas drilling rig that citizens built as a travelling protest. It will be the rig’s debut, and the red and black prop promises to be an eye-catcher.  As the rig attracts attention, Meyer and her fellow activists will be handing out flyers warning volunteers that their favorite urban refuges could be targets of development if the city allows gas drilling in parks as part of its larger ordinance governing drilling in Dallas.

 

Thousands of acres of Dallas parkland is currently under lease for drilling. The city council’s gas task force, including outgoing Park and Recreation Board President Joan Walne, reversed a previous position at the last minute and endorsed drilling in parkland. Although White Rock Lake isn’t a declared site, protesters picked the park because it’s the gem of the City’s park system and it’s in the district of Councilmember Sheffie Kadane, who’s been an unquestioning advocate of park drilling. During an August council briefing, Kadane was recorded as saying, “We’ve got parklands there that aren’t being utilized for anything. What else are you gonna put there?”

 

“I don’t know what kind of park system Councilmember Kadane grew up enjoying, but we believe that most Dallas residents like their parks without heavy industrial activity in them,” said Edward Hartmann, with the Texas Campaign for the Environment. “The fact that the city would even consider allowing gas drilling operations on parkland is appalling.”

 

Dallas Sierra Club Conservation Co-Chair Molly Rooke pointed out that there’s never been any drilling in Dallas parks and Kadane is working hard to change this. “Councilmen Kadane actually wants to open up our parks to a land rush by gas operators. This is why residents in his district need to firmly say they don’t support such a radical change, and they won’t vote to re-elect the Councilman if he continues to push for it.”

 

After the stop at White Rock Lake, the rig will make its way to Valley View Park by 11:00 a.m. for a Volunteer Appreciation Ceremony, where city officials are expected to gather.

 

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