Never has there been a more reasonable outcry. We know we can't live without clean air, clean water and clean food; we know our grandchildren may need this gas, but we don't need it. We need to lead our nation away from fossil fuels altogether, and fast. The cancellation of the DRBC meeting is a turning of the wheel of the nation away from that insanity. We are taking the helm. We are going sane.
The huge coalition we put together, including labor, students, community groups, businesses, environmentalists, scientists, physicians and public health advocates has put persistent pressure, in all the right places, with one great voice uniting against devastating our land, poisoning our water, and sickening our people for the sake of short-term profits. We are proud to be among this powerful ocean of voices for sane energy policy, for conservation, for beauty and wholeness, for health and vitality, undermining the cold corporate greed and arrogance which took for granted they could poison us here too. No they can't!
Gas Drilling Vote Cancelled
Delaware Governor to Vote No
For Immediate Release
November 17, 2011
Contacts:
Maya K. van Rossum, the Delaware Riverkeeper 215 801 3043 cell
Tracy Carluccio, Deputy Director, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, 215 692 2329 cell
Trenton, NJ: The November 21, 2011 vote to be held at the Trenton War Memorial by the Delaware River Basin Commission has been cancelled according to sources. The vote was to seek approval of regulations that would have allowed shale gas drilling in the Delaware River Basin by the beginning of 2012. The last minute cancellation is the second time this vote has been put off. And this time is believed to be in response to an announcement by the Governor of Delaware that he would vote against the regulatory/drilling proposal.
Delaware Riverkeeper Maya van Rossum praised Governor Markell. “Governor Markell has listened to the will of the people, to the science and to the tremendous environmental and community harm being caused by gas drilling where it is happening. The issue of shale gas drilling has finally moved out of the political arena and is now being treated as an issue of genuine public policy concern,” said Delaware Riverkeeper van Rossum.
“The residents of this region stood firm and demanded protection from the ravages of gas drilling; forcing the politicians to listen or risk their political ambitions,” van Rossum added.
While official announcement of the cancelled meeting has not yet been provided by the DRBC, the Delaware Riverkeeper Network confirmed this evening the availability of the Trenton War Memorial venue, considering it for their own uses, confirming its source information that the meeting has in fact been cancelled.
“This is a big win for our communities,” said Tracy Carluccio, Deputy Director of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network. “For the past month citizens have been writing letters, sending emails, and leaving phone messages for their elected officials – while at first they didn’t want to hear us, enough people reached out that they have been forced to.”
“This is a big win for the River and the region” concluded van Rossum, “Now we just need to put the nail in the coffin and make sure gas drilling in the Delaware River watershed stays down and out of our basin.”
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