Dimock Proud Video Highlights the Truth in Dimock
This week Dimock Proud released a video highlighting the opinions of the town’s residents in regards to natural gas development occurring there. The eight minute video, which is featured on CNN’s IReport platform, includes residents and business owners discussing the events in Dimock following the arrival of the natural gas industry. It also covers the town’s long history with methane in its drinking water aquifer with residents recounting methane in water wells as far back as 1945.
The motivation for creating the video is made pretty clear in the video’s description on IReport, it reads :
Recently a handful of families in Dimock, PA have joined forces with anti-natural gas activists to portray a false image of our town – one that claims our water and livelihoods have been impacted negatively by natural gas development.Regardless of how the media continues to portray our town, the residents here are aware of the truth and that is what is represented in this video.The sensible majority in Dimock, those of us not involved in the legal proceedings, are tired of our town’s reputation being dragged through the mud. This is the real story of a town divided by natural gas development. No more propaganda, no more lies, just the truth.
The video contained a few compelling quotes from residents of the town. The quotes show the resident’s frustration in dealing with the situation and misaligned headlines from across the globe. Bill Aiello, a Dimock Proud supporter, offered the following:
The effort by the mayor of Binghamton and by various environmental groups to use the Carter road situation as a publicity stunt was extremely offensive. The water testing had shown that the water available to those residents met drinking water standards.
And it’s very irritating because we have a wonderful community with remarkably sound water that is portrayed in the nation as some sort of a freak show, it’s ridiculous.
Another local couple, Bill and Stella Wallace, summed up their viewpoint of the situation rather succinctly:
I don’t know what they [the litigants] have to hear before they realize that their water is ok, I mean you had the Cabot tests, you had the state tests, and now you have the federal tests. I mean who has to come in here and tell them hey its ok you can drink it. Of course, I feel that the lawsuit they have against Cabot has a lot to do with it. If their water is good its not much of a lawsuit is it?
The good news for Dimock Proud, and the residents in this video, is that relief may be right around the corner as recent events are making the truth increasingly clear. In recent weeks, multiple rounds of water testing conducted by EPA show the town’s water is safe. The EPA has released data on 47 of the 61 water samplings it conducted. Each time declaring that no action is needed in regards to the town’s water quality. In fact, in all of the samples only one reading exceeded any water quality standard. That was for Arsenic which is a common groundwater pollutant in the region according to USGS. These results confirm earlier findings by Cabot Oil and Gas and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
With continued testing showing the town’s water to be safe it likely won’t be very long until these residents can go back to enjoying the peace and quiet of the area they know and love. In the meantime this video will help others understand what is actually occurring in the small Susquehanna County town.
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