Another Day, Another Misguided NY Community Bans Fracking

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The Oneida County legislature has banned fracking on county-owned lands—even though fracking isn’t currently allowed in the state. Apparently fixing problems that don’t exist passes for doing important legislative work in Oneida County. Must be the taxpayers in Oneida like funding that sort of thing…

Oneida County took a stand against hydrofracking on Wednesday. The board passed legislation, placing a county-wide moratorium on any shale gas extraction on county lands.

A number of community members expressed their opinions at the County Legislature meeting Wednesday. Many emphasized health hazards and environmental dangers they say are a result of hydrofracking. But not all county lawmakers felt a moratorium was the answer. "We’ve got to give the governor the Department of Environmental Conservation and the Health Department time to do this best way as possible and to see if it can be done safely without a whole bunch of people saying ‘no we’re not going to do it,’" said David Wood, (R) Oneida County Legislator.

"Oneida County has to lead a progressive effort in ensuring the things like hydraulic fracking that has a negative impact on the people that it needs to be addressed and we addressed it today, we put it to rest and hopefully the state government will follow suit," said David Gordon, (D) Oneida County Legislator.

The moratorium passed 21 to five.*

    *YNN (Apr 10, 2013) – Oneida County Legislature passes hydrofracking moratorium