Take Action – Citizens, let your voice be heard!
Boulder County
Ask Our Boulder County Commissioners to Enact a New Moratorium on Fracking to get public safety studies before drilling
Environmental Attorney Dan Leftwich gives public testimony on May 16 to the Boulder County Commissioners that a moratorium to obtain public safety data is legally defensibility and the “legal thing to do.”
The Boulder County Commissioners are making a decision on Tuesday, May 21 at 11 am. Please write to the Commissioners at commissioners@bouldercounty.org before Tuesday to ask for a multi-year moratorium on oil and gas drilling in Boulder County to first get health assessment studies.
If we do nothing, on June 11, oil and gas operators can begin submitting applications for fracking. The current moratorium on oil and gas drilling in Boulder County ends on June 10.
Click to download a Health Impact Letter for Medical and Healthcare providers.
Click to download Medical Studies Addendum on Public Safety Risks
We are urging the Commissioners to enact a NEW 24-month moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in Boulder County until we get the results of comprehensive health impact studies. A two-year moratorium will give us time to receive a halfway-point report from the National Science Foundation study including the health assessment component being led by medical researchers at University of Colorado at Boulder and Denver.
City of Boulder
Please mark your calendars for Tuesday, June 4 at 6 pm when the City Attorney’s Office will present a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing to obtain public safety studies. Public testimony is encouraged. Location: Boulder City Council Municipal Building, 1777 Broadway, 2nd floor.
On Tuesday, May 7, Boulder City Council members directed City Attorney Tom Carr to draft an ordinance calling for a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in the City of Boulder. Thank you Council members for being the first home rule city in Colorado to ask for public safety data before allowing fracking in Boulder.
Link to Daily Camera story.
You can write to the Boulder City Council members at council@bouldercolorado.gov to support that Boulder enact an ordinance for a moratorium on fracking until we can obtain comprehensive health impact studies.
We are requesting a five-year moratorium through 2018 tied to major multi-year public safety studies on hydraulic fracturing now underway with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Colorado Dept. of Public Health and the Environment, and the National Science Foundation (NSF) Sustainability Research Network. More about the NSF study at http://airwatergas.org.
According to the City of Boulder’s Open Space and Mountain Parks Department, there are 107 drilled wells on 2,700 acres in unincorporated Boulder County where the Open Space Department does not own the mineral rights and third parties own the leases on the land. Without control of the mineral rights or leases, our citizens, water and our environment are vulnerable to high-volume hydraulic fracturing.
Support the Boulder Municipal Utility
Boulder City Council is actively working toward Boulder’s Clean Energy Future as one of its top priorities for 2013. The oil & gas industry reports that 6 to 7% percent of fracked wells leak natural gas or methane at the time of installation. Methane directly contributes to Climate Change and is in direct conflict with Boulder’s Clean Energy Future.
Frack Free Boulder supports the Boulder Municipalization effort because local control of our electricity will move us as fast as possible to a future without fossil fuels. Under a Boulder muni, we can research and effectively seek out sources of natural gas that are not fracked, such as methane digesters at waste water treatment plants, cow manure and bio-gas (using plant non-food based bio sources.)
UPDATE: The Boulder muni got a YES vote 8-1 to continue to move forward by Boulder City Council members on April 16, 2013. On July 23, a special City Council meeting will take place for a first reading on the condemnation ordinance, to decide whether to proceed on buying the infrastructure from Xcel.
Note-worthy Anti-Fracking Activities
City of Boulder
Frack Free Boulder submitted a public letter that was included in the Boulder City Council January 2013 retreat packet. As a result, Council members Suzanne Jones and Lisa Morzel led a discussion about fracking at the Retreat on January 19. Thank you Zan and Lisa for your leadership to protect our environment.
State of Colorado
Coloradans Are Rising Up Against Fracking
Colorado residents are taking a stand. Fort Collins passed a ban fracking in March 2013. Citizens in Longmont voted overwhelmingly to ban fracking last November 2012 in a historic, citizen-driven effort. Fort Collins passed a moratorium on fracking with a unanimous city council vote in December 2012. El Paso County passed a moratorium at the end of 2011. Colorado Springs passed a moratorium in 2012. Erie and Boulder County passed a moratorium in 2012.
Hydraulic fracturing has been part of a number of bills during the 2013 Colorado legislative agenda. Stopping fracking is the right message to send to our politicians at the state level as this is a battle that needs to be won for all citizens in Colorado, and the rest of the state needs our support. Boulder and Boulder County can put in place ordinances that will help local governments throughout the state to base a moratorium on the need for more information, a legal path that has been used successfully in New York, Maryland and California.
Frack Free Boulder is part of Protect Our Colorado, a state-wide coalition to ban fracking. Download the press release.
National
Vermont was the first state in the U.S. to ban fracking. New York State passed a two-year moratorium on fracking from 2013 to 2015 thanks to the efforts of New Yorkers Against Fracking.
