WELC Welcomes Everyone and Says “Get It Done” Now!
With over 60 people in the audience the Women’s Energy Leadership Coalition held a meeting last night in Oneonta, New York, Otsego County. The meeting began with a social hour and buffet style dinner which helped people in attendance get to know each other and gave people time to carry on casual conversation. After dinner, Uni Blake made some opening remarks explaining what WELC is about and why it began.
The Women’s Energy Leadership Coalition was just an idea in the heads of six women a year ago before they created this extraordinary group of strong women from different walks of life. The idea that led to the creation of WELC branched from a conversation about energy development in New York State.
Many people mentioned they felt alone at town board meetings just a short year ago. They felt as if they were the only ones in the room speaking in support of natural gas and they were frankly scared to do so at some meetings. People sometimes just need to know there is another friendly face in the audience. It’s nice to know you aren’t the only one feeling the way you do!
This concept inspired the video “Silent No More” which was produced by Aaron Price. The video interviews six women (the same six women who began this group). In the film, all the women not only discuss what natural gas means to them, their families, and their friends/neighbors, but also to communities as a whole. The women discuss how the people against natural gas often try to intimidate members of the public and, sadly, how it sometimes works. They noted examples of business owners who took signs out of windows supporting natural gas because they feared they would lose business if they didn’t and, of course, no one can afford to lose business in this tough economy!
Unsurprisingly, the main point brought up by each of the six women was the need for jobs. The job growth created by natural gas development would be substantial enough to keep their kids in the area in which they were raised and, of course, close to their parents. They want their kids to be able to find jobs and raise their own families in the very same town they grew up in. Natural gas development can help families stay together and what mother doesn’t desire that?
Five of the six women featured in “Silent No More” were in the audience at the WELC meeting. They all spoke and provided encouraging messages to the audience. On top of all their positive messages, they reminded the audience they didn’t want anything bad to happen to their land, water, air or families either! Unlike many natural gas opponents, they had actually researched the issue and knew there was nothing to fear but fear itself, and, like Shelly DePue, came to the conclusion that it is fear that is toxic, not natural gas development or hydraulic fracturing. After they spoke, they showed the film and it was received.
The topic of economics was brought up several times. Not only is there direct job growth in the natural gas industry but there is also much job growth that comes about indirectly. The direct jobs created by the industry aren’t just those involving physical development or hydraulic fracturing of a natural gas well. There are also welders, landmen, people researching titles, office positions, and many other occupations.
The guest speaker of the night was Sonia Lindell, Communications Specialist for the Business Council of New York State. She discussed the variety of jobs involved and the amount the state could grow from these jobs directly and indirectly generated by the natural gas industry. She had a great powerpoint presentation which she shared with the group. One slide compared Bradford County, Pennsylvania to Tioga County, New York. I’m sure you can guess what the comparison showed! In Bradford County the economy is increasing, jobs are being added and in Tioga County, New York the economy is decreasing and jobs are being cut. What more is there to say?
She also stated the natural gas industry provides good paying jobs. On average, the majority of the jobs, if not all of them, pay better than average. Natural gas is expected to bring up to 54,000 full time, good paying jobs directly created by natural gas development in New York, when development finally proceeds. This doesn’t count the jobs that will be indirectly created. In addition, natural gas development is expected to bring nearly $2.4 billion in new investments to New York state. In area’s like the Southern Tier, which has long been economically depressed, this is welcome news.
There was a question and answer period at the end of the meeting where the focus was on getting involved by speaking, writing and calling of Governor Cuomo. The group hopes to continue adding friendly faces of both women (and men) to their numbers. Call someone involved, check it out, get involved yourself!
Ed Patrick
Posted at 12:56h, 22 JulyThe need for jobs is far less important than the need for clean drinking water. Did you not get the memo? We are made primarily OF water and, therefore, need water to survive. There is ZERO reasonable argument on your behalf stating that once wells are drilled that casings will last FOREVER, thereby preventing the “produced water” from seeping into ground water, lakes, streams, etc. Because of the simple fact that these chemicals are corrosive, flammable, carcinogenic, and hazardous to all living things, this practice is NOT OK. Unless each and every proponent of the natural gas movement offers to have a well placed in their own yard, I will NEVER be sold on the safety of drilling for natural gas. Once every one of these women and every executive from every drilling company has a well on their own property, get back to me on the safety of this practice. Until then, my skepticism is the only preventative action I can take that will ensure that I can take showers, make coffee with tap water, wash vegetables in my sink and all the other things I use water for, without having to have multi-thousand dollar filters installed to do so. The mere fact that these companies are subsidizing these filters for people whose water has become hazardous can only suggest that they KNOW they are causing these problems. I’ve never in my life seen someone shell out money to pay for a problem or damages that they, themselves, did not cause. That is all, for now…
Tom Shepstone
Posted at 20:28h, 22 JulyYour argument rests on the assumption water quality is threatened and it is not. There is no case of fracturing polluting a water supply – NONE! We have documented this repeatedly. Also, I have leased my own land and would be delighted to have multiple wells located on it. Finally, please read up on “presumed liability” which requires gas companies to assume they caused a problem even where there is no evidence of the same. Moreover, most companies willing extend this concept to well outside the legal limits, whether you believe it or not, simply because it pays to be a good neighbor.
Ed
Posted at 21:36h, 22 JulyNo evidence? So the movie Gasland is 1 hour and 50 minutes of special effects? These people who turn on their tap water and hold a lighter to it, watching it burst into flames, while living in the immediate vicinity of numerous gas wells are demonstrating mere coincidence? Pumping gallons and gallons of hazardous chemicals into the ground below us, with only a small separation of cement (which, last I checked, is VERY susceptible to failure) between those chemicals and the water we drink, and at such high pressures so as to DESTROY SHALE 1000’s of feet down, is inevitably a disaster waiting to happen, whether you or these HONEST GAS COMPANIES say so. Presumed liability is just a friendly euphemism for “we know if something happened, it was PROBABLY you, so just dish out the money and shut people up, whether it actually was or not.” The fact of the matter is that these gas companies, like oil companies have the same backing influence from the rich and the lobbying to go with it, so no matter what the common man sees, it’s all a falacy. We can’t POSSIBLY know what we’re talking about, because we aren’t a highly paid executive, whose primary concern has ‘always’ been for the people, and not their wallets. They have the money to handle the “slap on the wrist” fines they get when disaster does strike (these wells HAVE exploded), just as BP demonstrated, and they have the money to buy off resistance. Until you and the rest of the American public start believing in our own senses (sight, taste, and smell specifically in this case), and not in what corporate drilling companies tell us, we will never have the upper hand. I don’t want to imagine what will happen if, in 50 years, all of these well casings start to fail (there IS evidence that they do-drilling companies, themselves, have scientific study demonstrating this likelihood) and all of the leaked natural gas just sitting below us starts to make it’s way upward and outward. The ONLY difference between this and oil drilling is that when this F’s up, as it has and will, its OUR water supply and not the water our ocean life lives (and dies) in. How many more BP and Exxon Valdez incidents do we need to occur before we decide that enough catastrophic loss of life has taken place and move on to a safer, more renewable energy source? We are just moving that fallible process into our own backyards and when the $#!+ hits the fan, WE ALL have to pay the price! So while you may want to “happily” lease your land to these ‘honest corporations’ and look at that eyesore dotting the landscape, while we all sit on the precipice of ONLY losing our entire freshwater supply on account of YET ANOTHER less-than-stellar move to YET ANOTHER non-renewable resource, I do not. I see a better way (Wind/Solar/Hydroelectric) to provide energy to people, ones which ARE renewable, which DO create jobs of ALL kinds, and which does not jeopardize the one resource THE ENTIRE WORLD needs to survive, that which we have PLENTY in our country-fresh water. If we lose that (which we should be protecting with our LIVES), we lose everything. Not just our supply of drinking water, but the animals that drink it, crops that require it, and the environment around us which exists based SOLELY on a delicate balance of all of those things continuing to exist. This is absolute nonsense at it’s core. Fight it all you want, defend it all you want, but if this little plan of yours goes through and EVEN one Exxon Valdez-like incident occurs in JUST the right spot, you will have to look at yourself in the mirror and come to terms with the fact that you enabled irreparable damage to generations upon generations of humankind. Best of luck to you.
Tom Shepstone
Posted at 21:41h, 23 JulyHope you feel better, Ed! That’s quite a rant and no paragraph breaks either! How’s that Solyndra job working out for you?
Ed Patrick
Posted at 22:58h, 23 JulyI’ll feel better when people stop trusting corporations. Until then, my head will spin, knowing that people (including yourself) are so easily manipulated into believing that ANY of this is about your best interest or mine. This is about making money, changing the balance of power in the world of fuel production, all while (as usual) the consequences are the least of anyone’s concern.
In the interest of preventing your eyes from getting lost, I will provide you with the needed paragraph breaks.
I have many more rants left in me. I represent the people who will suffer from any catastrophic failure in natural gas wells. I represent animals and plants who will die when this occurs. While I might be self appointed in this role, someone has to stand up for the little people; the ones being offered seemingly significant amounts of money to sell the integrity of their own private property to be raped and pillaged by these corporations. I don’t want to see it, therefore, I won’t shut up until it’s no longer a threat.
Tom Shepstone
Posted at 09:34h, 24 JulyWho made you that representative, Ed? Did the animals vote for you? The plants? Other people? Nah, I don’t think so. You have have designated yourself, haven’t you, holding yourself above all other opinions?
Pingback:Just Imagine – Fuel for Freedom
Posted at 10:22h, 16 November[…] Aaron Price Director of Gas Odyssey and Silent No More […]