The Genesee County-based drilling company Lenape Resources filed a lawsuit late last month to force the citizens of Avon, in nearby Livingston County, to accept hydrofracking.
It's not the first time that Big Oil and Gas has tried to intimidate local communities. In the Tompkins County of town of Dryden, we were sued by Anschutz Exploration for trying to protect our town of 14,500 people from the impacts of fracking. Also last year, Norse Energy, a Norwegian company, replaced Anschutz Exploration in the litigation.
You can swap out the plaintiff in a lawsuit, but it doesn't change the nature of this fight. It's David vs. Goliath. Us against them.
Outside energy companies like Norse don't value our communities. They want to come into our towns, exploit our resources — by blasting millions of gallons of chemically treated water into the ground to fracture the shale and force out oil and gas — and move on. But it's not going to happen, not if we can stop it.
The energy industry claims that the gas rush will bring jobs to upstate New York; but those claims are overblown. When more than 1,000 New York businesses recently called on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to maintain the state's moratorium, they noted that fracking has failed to create long-term jobs in other states. The promise of temporary jobs is not worth the risk to the health and well-being of our neighbors and children. The law is on our side.
Last February, the state Supreme Court ruled that Dryden had the right, through its zoning powers, to prohibit oil and gas activities in our town.
We won, but the case isn't over. Norse appealed and the matter is now pending in the appellate court.
Following the ruling in favor of Dryden, three other courts — two in New York and one in Pennsylvania — agreed that local communities cannot be forced to accept zoning laws that authorize industry to frack wherever it pleases. Many other states, including Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Wyoming, recognize this right of self-determination when it comes to oil and gas drilling.
In other states, the fracking-enabled drilling rush has hurt people and wildlife, poisoned the water and air, created noise and long lines of truck traffic, and driven down property values.
The Endocrine Disruption Exchange, a Colorado research group, has identified more than 360 fracking chemicals and found that almost 80 percent of them may harm skin, eyes, and sensory organs. Fifty-five percent could damage the brain and nervous system and more than 20 percent may cause cancer.
Citizens — speaking through their elected local governments — have the right to decide for themselves what goes on within town limits. And Dryden, along with more than 100 municipalities across New York, has said "no" to fracking.
Norse Energy will be interested in upstate New York as long as it is lucrative. But we're not leaving. To us — and our constituents and neighbors — Dryden is home.
Diverse groups of people who don't normally agree have come together in opposition to fracking. More than 550 elected officials representing every county in New York have signed a letter to Cuomo urging him to keep the moratorium in place until the facts and the science prove that fracking is safe.
The signers of this letter, like the signers of this article, include both Democrats and Republicans.
Mary Ann Sumner is the supervisor of the town of Dryden and a Democrat. Stephen J. Stelick Jr. is a councilman in the town of Dryden and a Republican.