Baseball Hall of Fame Hometown Bans Fracking! the people have spoken!

The Daily Star, Oneonta, NY - otsego county news, delaware county news, oneonta news, oneonta sports
May 13, 2011

By Tom Grace
Cooperstown News Bureau

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The Otsego Town Board approved by a 4-1 vote Wednesday revisions to its land-use law that strengthen a ban on gas drilling and hydrofracking within the town, according to town Supervisor Meg Kiernan.
With the vote, the town board clarified the definition of "mineral extraction," an activity that has been allowed in a residential-agricultural district within the town. The law now specifies that while the removal of gravel, rock, stone, sand, fill, topsoil or "unconsolidated" minerals has been allowed, extraction of natural gas and petroleum is not permitted, she said.

"The reason the law read the way it did is that we had a gravel pit in the town," Kiernan said.
The revision makes it clear that while gravel mining has been allowed, this permission should not extend to natural gas drillers. Kiernan said the proposed land-use law revisions were unanimously approved Monday by the county planning board. Wednesday's vote by the town board followed an outpouring from residents who want to be protected from the ill effects of drilling and hydrofracking _ the process of injecting natural gas wells with millions of gallons of water, chemicals and sand to stimulate production, she said.

"In meetings, in letters and in talking to people, it was clear that an overwhelming majority wanted us to do this," she said. Drilling and fracking opponents applauded the town's action, perhaps the first of its kind in the state.

In an e-mail received by The Daily Star, town resident Adrian Kuzminski, moderator of Sustainable Otsego, wrote: "It is the first rural town in New York state to explicitly invoke its home rule authority to block gas drilling as a type of undesirable heavy industry incompatible with the town's comprehensive plan." Kiernan said that while being first is momentous, the town looks forward to having other towns follow suit.