Governor of New York may be Planning for Fracking in Southern Tier

NY “towns” seek to ban fracking

The New York Times reported that Governor Andrew Cuomo is pursuing a policy that would allow fracking in a few of the most impoverished New York counties in the southwestern part of the state. Fracking would be allowed in Broome, Chemung, Chenango, Steuben and Tioga Counties, but only in individual towns that agree to it. It also would only take effect if state regulators at the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) officially approve the fracking process in New York state.

New Yorkers Against Fracking, a coalition of diverse organizations that oppose fracking, issued the following statement in response to the New York Times report:

“Sending a polluting industry into our most economically impoverished communities is a violation of environmental justice,” said New Yorkers Against Fracking founder Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D., a biologist and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Ithaca College. Steingraber notes that at least one Southern Tier community is already struggling with excess cancer rates and birth defects as a result of past boom-and-bust industrial practices that have left plumes of contaminated groundwater in their wake.

“The pregnant mother who drinks unfiltered water from a rural well in the Susquehanna River valley has the same right to environmental protection as the mother in Manhattan who drinks unfiltered water brought to her from the off-limits New York City watershed, ” said Steingraber.

“Partitioning our state into frack and no-frack zones based on economic desperation is a shameful idea, and we will actively oppose its implementation. Demonstration projects are another name for sacrifice zones. And there are no children and counties in our beloved state that we are willing to sacrifice.”

CALL TO ACTION

Call Gov. Cuomo at 866-584-6799 and tell him, “It is not ok to sacrifice any part of New York, fracking would create the greatest health and environmental disaster in New York’s history, if you break it you own it.”

RALLY

What: Demonstration outside DEC Region 7 Headquarters

When: Thursday, June 14 3:30 – 5 p.m.

Where: 615 Erie Boulevard West, Syracuse, NY

New Yorkers Against Fracking, a new coalition of diverse organizations that support a fracking ban, are joining together to tell Governor Cuomo and our leaders in Albany to stand up for New Yorkers to keep our water and our state safe by banning hydrofracking.