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Philly Congressional Reps Quiet on Fracking While NYC Pols Growl
Why isn't Philadelphia's congressional delegation as vocal as New York's in defending the city's water supply in the face of natural gas drilling? In response to City Paper query, Rep. Bob Brady becomes first PA rep to sign onto natural gas oversight legislation.
Philly Congressional Reps Quiet on Fracking While NYC Pols Growl
Last week, members of Congress from New York, Maryland and Massachusetts demanded an investigation of the natural gas industry following a New York Times report uncovering evidence that drillers are inflating projected reserves (the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, has rules that “allow companies to avoid disclosing details about the proprietary technology used to predict future gas production and to avoid some third-party audits of those predictions”--i.e., no one’s checking their math...this is no surprise given the SEC’s see-no-evil regulation of Wall Street leading up to the financial crisis, but that’s another story entirely).
This followed previous articles in the Times’ “Drilling Down” series documenting the lack of regulation of the natural gas industry and the potentially serious harm that could be posed to public health and the environment in our state and elsewhere.
So, what were Pennsylvania’s elected officials doing? Many were writing a letter to President Obama asking for more drilling with less oversight in the Marcellus Shale. Letter writers, including Pennsylvania Democrats Jason Altmire and Mark Critz, and Republican Bill Shuster, condemned “any regulatory regimes that will delay our national security priorities” and “encouraging the continued development and utilization of our Nation’s vast natural gas resources by any means necessary, but most specifically, by unconventional shale gas recovery.”
Natural gas is booming throughout Pennsylvania, and the Delaware River Basin Commission may approve wells in our watershed once they develop new regulations. If drilling were to begin up the Delaware River from Philly, environmentalists say that our drinking water supply could be in danger. Philly’s representatives haven’t joined Western PA politicians in calling for more drilling, but they have been far less active and outspoken than New York’s in defending the city’s drinking water supply.
Representative Allyson Schwartz spokesperson Tali Israeli wrote that since the Delaware River Basin Commission “has yet to determine how to proceed...currently, there are no threats from hydrofracking to the Philadelphia water supply..”
Representative Chaka Fattah spokesperson Ron Goldwyn wrote that the congressman was busy “protecting the Environmental Protection Agency from attacks on its regulatory role,” and the EPA could certainly use all the help it can get right now.
He went on to stress that “Congressman Fattah remains concerned about the safety of the water supply and applauds the effort of some in the City Council and from the State. But if the state refuses to protect the water supply then he believes that fracking protection is necessary to ensure the quality of the water supply. If the State won’t act then the EPA must.”
Efforts by the state? If the Republican leadership in Harrisburg can’t even tax natural gas, it seems unlikely they will regulate it.
Senator Bob Casey did introduce legislation that would require companies to reveal what chemicals they use to frack (that’s right: they are not already required to do so).
And Congressman Bob Brady, according to spokesperson Karen Warrington, is the only Pennsylvania member of the House to sign on as a co-sponsor of the House version of the bill, the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act of 2011.
“Congressman Brady is very focused and concerned about the possibility of the contamination of Philadelphia’s municipal water supply as a result of fracking,” writes Warrington. “And, he supports the decision by the PA Department of Health to begin tracking health complaints related to natural gas drilling. The Congressman says that there are many issues to be weighed regarding fracking but the protection of our water supply has to be our number one concern and that’s not up to debate.”
He signed onto it yesterday--after I contacted their office.
Though neither Fattah nor Schwartz has yet to sign on as a cosponsor, Fattah did vote for an “amendment [that] would have prevented natural gas industry executives from serving on what is supposed to be a neutral federal advisory panel on shale gas drilling.” Obama’s natural gas advisory panel is already stacked, with six (of seven) members holding industry ties .
Republican Mike Fitzpatrick, who represents a sliver of far Northeast Philly, did not respond to requests for comment.
We already know that state politicians are in hock to the natural gas industry (third year straight with no tax on natural gas, making us the only state in the nation to not have such a tax. See Will Bunch’s discussion of Corbett’s industry ties here). But it’s our representatives in Washington too, and that’s not really surprising: Pennsylvania politics have long been dominated by natural resources, from big coal to steel.
“Pennsylvania has a long history with extractive industries,” says Jan Jarrett, President of Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future. “We are still the 4th largest producer of coal in the country and we've had a natural gas industry in Pennsylvania for more than half a century. We are a coal and heavy industry state and that is important to both Republicans, who generally favor industry, and Democrats, who favor unions - it has always complicated environmental and energy policy.”
But why the silence on fracking from Philadelphia representatives like Bob Brady, Chaka Fattah, and Allyson Schwartz? Our East Coast city doesn’t get any jobs from the natural gas boom while the toxic drilling process could foul our drinking water.
In January, Curtis Jones led Philly’s City Council to pass a (somewhat toothless) resolution calling for a temporary ban on drilling in the Delaware River Basin. The difference between Philly and New York (which passed a resolution in December 2009), suggests Environmental Advocates Water and Natural Resources Program Director Katherine Nadeau, is that vocal leadership by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has prompted a much more aggressive posture on the part of that city’s congressional delegation. And perhaps most importantly, the entire state of New York, unlike Pennsylvania, has held off on fracking until they better understand the risks to the environment and human health.
“New York’s federal representatives have been on the issue since it first started to develop in New York State,” she told me. “By virtue of fact that New York has taken time out to review fracking issue, it has really given our lawmakers time to become really knowledgeable and weigh in on the issue.”
The country needs energy. The country needs jobs. Both are available in Pennsylvania shale. Therefore the enviornmentalists are opposed mining it.— njredneck- IN AN FRANCISCO PANIC PLAYHOUSE OF RWM PLAYWRIGTS LAB WEST DOING "FRACKERS QUARTET' BY DR LARRY MYERS WHO WROTE 20 PLAY"OCCUPATION PREOCCUPATION' AND "PENN STATE PENTAGRAM' 5 PLAYS AND 3 IN 'SYRACUSE TRYTYCH'
RWM PLAYWRIGHYTS LAB
THEATER THINK TANK
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HM THEATER COLLECTIVE— Father Edgar L Myerson
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