Councilmember Scott Griggs Hosts Gas Drilling Meeting

Our Neighborhood and the City of Dallas is at stake!

Proposed Gas Drilling Rig of ExxonMobile at FM 1382 and Camp Wisdom Rd

Protecting Our Community from Gas Drilling -

An Update on the New Ordinance

 

Hosted by Councilmember Scott Griggs

Thursday, June 14 @ 6:30 pm

Hampton-Illinois Library (2951South Hampton Rd)

GAS WELLS IN OUR NEIGHBORHOOD ....

.... only if you let it happen.

Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance residents have been attending the Dallas Gas Drilling Task Force's meetings at City Hall from July, 2011 to February, 2012.  All 22 meetings and 2 Public Hearings.  The Task Force has made their recommendations.  And we're not happy with them and you're not going to be happy with them either.

Here is a chart we made for you of the key areas we're not happy with and they MUST be changed.

Task Force Recommendations that Must be Strengthened:

ISSUE	TASK FORCE	SOLUTION
Too close for comfort	Separate and unequal protections: 1000 feet from homes, schools, hospitals and places of worship, but less for offices, shopping centers and restaurants—and gas companies can ask for a “variance” of just 500 feet for any of these!	Dallas should proceed with caution. The Army Corps of Engineers recommends a setback of 3000 feet for the protection of a dam. Dallas should use this as a guideline to uniformly protect its residents where we live, work, worship and play.
Secret toxic chemicals	Gas companies can keep the full list of toxic chemicals they use to frack permanently hidden, calling it their “trade secret.” Not even Dallas police, firefighters and medical professionals would be given this information.	Dallas’ first responders are on the front lines every day and will be put at high risk of exposure to these toxic chemicals. Dallas should demand full disclosure of all chemicals with no “trade secret” exemptions.
Water for drinking, not for fracking	Fracking uses 1-8 million gallons of water for each new gas well—and this water is permanently contaminated with toxic chemicals. Gas companies would be allowed to do this even during severe droughts, and even use drinking water from Dallas to drill in other cities.	Dallas should charge gas companies twice as much for using our water since it will be contaminated and lost forever, ban the exporting of our drinking water to other cities for the purpose of fracking and ban water for fracking as a part of Dallas’ Stage III drought restrictions.
Save our parklands & floodplains	Reverse the current gas drilling ordinance in order to allow fracking inside Dallas parklands and floodplains—as well as all compressor stations, storage tanks and other industrial equipment.	Allowing industrial development inside our parklands and floodplains is dangerous, risky and costly. Dallas should keep the existing prohibition on fracking inside parklands and floodplains, and protect these with 3000 foot setbacks.
Protect the  air we breathe	Allow fracking operations to continue contributing as much CO2 as all the cars on D/FW roads, which would all but eliminate the recently adopted Dallas climate action plan.	Dallas should require the gas industry to  use their own Best Practises so as to not add to the smog producing and poisonous gases in Dallas' air.
Effective oversight	Continue relying on failed state and federal efforts to police fracking operations in the D/FW Metroplex, and these outside agencies to handle problems when they arise.	Dallas should establish its own industry-funded office of gas drilling oversight. This office must have enough trained personnel, equipped with the latest technology, to be able to provide help to residents 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance Leaders  Stand Up by Attending:

Citywide Organizing Meeting on Gas Drilling in Dallas
Tuesday, March 27th
7 to 8:30 pm
Center for Community Cooperation
2900 Live Oak
Dallas, TX 75204

Email mcnadallas@yahoo.com with any questions.

Dallas Gas Drilling Task Force Makes Recommendations

CONFUSING   CONFUSING

After 8 months of studying ordinances from Ft Worth, Arlington, Grand Prairie, Flower Mound, and Hurst, the Dallas Gas Drilling Task Force has made its confusing and hard to understand recommendations.


The upshot is Dallas has a weaker proposed ordinance of protection for their citizens than most of the other cities they studied.


http://www.dallascityhall.com/pdf/GasDrilling/GasDrillingandProductionOrdinance_030112.pdf


Of major importance is the "setback" or distance required from a gas drilling and production use to a protected use is as follows:  1,000 ft minimum spacing measured from the property line of the operation/pad site to  ....


residential, institutional and community service uses *


.... but the City Council may grant a setback distance of not less than 500 ft for protected use with 2/3 vote in favor.


The distance for Habitable Structures (is any use that is not a protected use) is 300' from the property line of the operation/pad site. 


.... So our homes* could be between 500 ft to 1000 ft from a pad site 


.... and anything else can be 300 ft?


Got that?  You need to be a lobbyist to keep track of this!  


Their will be a:

Citywide Organizing Meeting on Gas Drilling in Dallas

Tuesday, March 27th  7 to 8:30 pm

Center for Comunity Cooperation

2900 Live Oak, Dallas

* See exceptions on link.

Gas Task Force Actions Will Affect Mountain Creek

A Gas Drilling Pad

CITIZEN ACTION ALERT  

Help us defend the protections for schools and parks in Dallas from gas drilling we've already won against an industry assault this pastTuesday.  

Please send one e-mail to the 11 member Dallas Gas Drilling Task Force TODAY that simply says:  

"Don't roll back buffer zones for parks or schools." 

  

(Dallas ) - If gas industry representatives get their way during the final Gas Drilling Task Force meeting next Tuesday, fracking will be allowed much closer to homes and schools, and even inside Dallas parks, a reversal of previous positions.    

What's ironic is that the President of the Dallas Parks and Recreation, Joan Walne, may facilitate these efforts.

Walne has been voting with industry throughout the course of the Task Force meetings, participating in votes this week that removed protections already agreed to for flood plain drilling. In the past, she's had no problem with the idea of sacrificing city parks to drilling rigs. She's expected to be a key vote next Tuesday.

"As it turns out, putting Joan Walne in charge of protecting Dallas public parks from the gas industry on this Task Force was like putting John Dillinger in charge of protecting the city's bank account," said Downwinders at Risk Director Jim Schermbeck.

Besides allowing rigs and giant compressors in parks, the Task Force is also expected to be asked by industry representatives to " revisit" the current recommendation requiring a 1000 foot setback from all homes, schools and churches and hospitals. They want it rolled back to between 500 and 700 feet, similar to restrictions in Fort Worth. 

"After already agreeing to inadequate 1000-foot buffer zones weeks ago for these "protected uses," industry now wants to go back and have another try at significantly cutting those distances," warned Zac Trahan of the Texas Campaign for the Environment. "They want to put a well pad as close as 500 feet from a school or hospital or home. A well pad could mean as many as 24 wells, a battery of storage tanks, and a large compressor that generates thousands of tons of air pollution a year. That's unacceptable to us, and we think, most Dallas residents."

Walne, as well as Texas Business for Clean Air Director Margaret Keliher, and Dallas attorney John McCall are expected to be key votes on the setbacks issue. Keliher had led the effort to disregard the current ordinance and allow drilling in Dallas floodplains, while McCall is supporting rigs as close as 300 feet to commercial pieces of property like office building, restaurant or other place of business.

Both Schermbeck and Trahan urged Dallas residents to e-mail the Task Force member and express their concern at the upcoming votes. "With only 11 members, and previous protections hanging on lots of 6-5 votes, an absence or change of heart has large ramifications," said Schermbeck. "We need Dallas residents to wake up and realize their fate is hanging on only a couple of votes from people they didn't elect."

E-mail Addresses of Dallas Gas Drilling Task Force Members:

joniwalne@aol.com  

loisgfinkelman@sbcglobal.net 
john@attorneymccall.com 
RAlvarez@edf.org
biegler@southcrossenergy.com 
cherelle.blazer@gmail.com
bbullock@mail.cox.smu.edu 
margaret@margaretkeliher.com 
pshaw@woodshawlaw.com 
David.Sterling@unthsc.edu 
twelch@bhlaw.net   

Mountain Creek Area Alert: Redistricting Changes

A Mountain Creek Area Neighborhood

 A message from Councilman Griggs,

Our Dallas City Council is taking up the important topic of redistricting.  Every ten years we redraw our council districts and this Saturday is your opportunity to tell the full Dallas City Council what you think:

Saturday, September 24, 2011

3pm - 6pm

Dallas City Hall

1500 Marilla Street

I hope to see you there.  This is one of the most important meetings you can attend.  Please see the maps that will be discussed at:

http://www.dallascityhall.com/Redistricting/planReview.html

Please join me in supporting the Jasso Griggs Amendments to Plan 16, which keep our Oak Cliff in TWO council districts and maintain the historic connection between Mountain Creek/The Woods and North Oak Cliff.  Other plans threaten to break Oak Cliff into FOUR council districts and divide our community west of I-35.  This is an important meeting!  And YOU will have a chance to be heard!