BOULDER -Every community member who spoke during the public comment section of the Boulder County Commissioners meeting tonight asked for a ban or at least a moratorium on fracking in Boulder County. Over forty county residents gave three-minute testimonies to the board about why they reject fracking the process of removing natural gas from underneath the earth’s surface through a process of hydraulic fracturing. Some residents broke down in tears during testimony, “Personally this issue has really torn me up inside and it feels like the end of the world to me,” Gabriel Perry of Boulder commented to the Board, “It’s not like the shale is going anywhere. We’ve extended the moratorium on fracking by four months to conduct this road impact study so why can’t we extend the moratorium further to conduct a proper and thorough investigation on how fracking will actually impact our health and environment.”
photos: Tiburcia Vidal/The Nation Report
Micah Parkin, Regional Coordinator for 350.org asks Commissioners for a new or extended moratorium on new fracking permits.
Perry was referring to the current moratorium on drilling applications in place to give Boulder County time to study the impact of the industry on county roads and is set to expire June 10. Tonight the Board voted to assess a $37,900 impact fee for each fracked well on a single well pad after Boulder County Transportation Director George Gerstle gave results of an infrastructure impact study to County Commissioners, “When I think of the implications to the capital infrastructure that we have in the county, if we take money from resurfacing a road somewhere else and we put it into resurfacing a road to address oil and gas impacts there’s a real capital impact to the county of not repairing that first road. It’ll fall apart more quickly and there’s a cost to that. That’s a real direct cost associated with capital because of oil and gas development.”
Carolyn Bninski, member of the Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center tells Commissioners, “I actually believe you don’t want fracking in Boulder County.”
Noble Energy Inc. and Encana Oil and Gas Inc. criticized the impact study methodology, nevertheless the impact fee was unanimously approved by Commissioners. The fee amount assessed still did not satisfy some residents who attended the meeting. Some county residents have expressed an objection to the use of county tax dollars to pay the expenses of a private company above and beyond road repair such as code enforcement and policing. Fred Gabriel of Longmont said that trucks race by him and that the companies “should pay for all of this.”
Refufia Gaintan/The Nation Report
