WHO's listening?

THE people...that's WHO.

Check out the Letters in the FW Weekly.  Send them to your friends, write your own.  Make some noise Fort Worth, this is YOUR town.

The Weekly staff did a fantastic overview (“Who’s Listening at City Hall?” June 16, 2010) of our esteemed city hall leaders and their collusionary tactics to have things “their way,” no matter the consequences to our communities or environment.

Mayor Moncrief couldn’t pass the litmus test to be hired as dog-catcher. His ego and his cronies have bullied Fort Worth long enough. Not informing the public prior to ordinance changes and then passing them under the table without public comments or recommendations in city hall’s “backroom” should serve notice that these money-hungry “public servants” are due to be voted out come next election. There’s power in the people’s vote, and they need to exercise it to its full potential and show Moncrief and Company there’s another angle to the “Fort Worth Way!”

So, very grudgingly, they came back to our monthly neighborhood meeting and essentially said, “We know that the majority of the neighborhood is against the closing of Galvez Avenue, but we are proceeding anyway.”

The Oakhurst community is correct: The city, under the direction of Mike Moncrief, has become a tone-deaf fiefdom.

This city has rapidly returned to the “bad old days” of closed-door, good-ol’-boy dealings, and the taxpaying citizens of any neighborhood east of downtown are locked out — all while Mayor Mike screams for civility.

Hey local media!

TXSharon has a question for you concerning OUR water and YOUR help (or lack thereof). 

And we have to ask WHY no one picks up on WHY there are so many wells near creeks?  They will.  Question is, will it be too late?

What do you know?

Not enough when it comes to YOUR water. Check out the Region C Water Planning info here.

Notice no mention of the millions of gallons used for fracing. Instead YOU need to conserve. Also, take note how many times an "aquifer" is the main source of water to large areas. What happens when that water is contaminated?

WHO's paying attention?

Gas drillers blaming city for rejecting its drilling plans.  WHY would they be rejected?  Maybe because they weren't what they were cracked up to be?

Read about it in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Chesapeake says it will invoke a contract provision that will give the company another year to resolve permit issues without additional compensation for mineral rights, the residents said.

Residents also say Chesapeake is ignoring a verbal commitment to drill in a less-populated area north of the highway. That promise was made by another gas company that drew up the leases three years ago and sold them to Chesapeake, residents said. They said they weren't aware that Rush Creek was the target site until Chesapeake told them in April.

"If they had gone to the site that was originally promised, they wouldn't have this problem right now," said Cathy Meachum, chairwoman of United Neighbors, a coalition of a dozen neighborhoods and 1,100-plus homes that signed leases but opposed the new site. "The concerns that are there now will still be there in a year."

Chesapeake officials did not return several phone calls and an e-mail seeking comment on their drilling plans.

"They waited until the 11th hour knowing this lease was going to expire this fall, thinking they could ramrod this thing through and nobody would have anything to stop them with," said Bill Campbell, a member of United Neighbors' leadership committee. "I guess they thought this was in the bag."

"That's part of the problem," Cluck said. "If they drill one well, they don't have to drill again for several years."

Chesapeake told residents after the council vote that it would send them letters invoking " force majeure" -- French for "major force." Historically, this provision is a legal defense inserted into contracts because of major, unforeseen events such as acts of God, war, riots and labor disputes.

Coming Soon?

To a yard near you..
It ain't just Fort Worth selling its people out.
Read about it in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. 

Listening now?

Thanks to TXSharon who pointed out the Dallas Morning News article on the TCEQ meeting last week. And thanks to those who posted comments on the site...they are great. Keep up the great work!

People who gathered Thursday night at Arlington City Hall were mad about smog, and they were even madder about the state agency in charge of fighting smog.

At a Texas Commission on Environmental Quality meeting about the latest round of strategies for cleaning up the air in North Texas, about 200 people cheered and applauded calls for tougher pollution rules.

They jeered – and coughed in unison, holding up paper masks that looked like gas masks – when state officials couldn't answer their questions.

Be sure and read ALL the comments, they are excellent!  (The shills must have taken a day off).  Here's part of a comment from a parent who was in attendance with her daughter...hard to explain to your kids WHY no one was listening....)
My daughter has more of a vested interest in this meeting and what the future holds for her North Texas air than Susana Hildebrand.

I struggled with how to explain to her that we drove an hour and a half one-way, and stayed long after the one who is charged with protecting her did.

“I’m sorry, honey, there goes the person that is supposed to protect you. There goes the person that is supposed to care about your well-being. She works for you, yes we pay her salary, yes she is in a position that is supposed to protect your environment. She must not have noticed that you were here. I’m sure she wouldn’t have walked out at exactly 9:00 p.m. if she had known that you were here.”

Only in Texas...

Would a sentence about a State agency read like this....

State environmental regulators "absolutely" will consider Barnett Shale emissions as part of a new plan to bring North Texas into compliance with federal ozone standards, an official with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality said Thursday night.

So is it "absolutely" or will consider?

"We are particularly concerned about those emissions in Tarrant County," Hildebrand said. "I'm telling you, we are looking at those monitors. Our plan will look at those sites."

"Are you here to protect the citizens, the people who came out here today, or are you here to protect large corporations?" Tillman asked. "Because frankly, I don't know whose side you're on."

One of the few speakers not critical of the agency was Ed Ireland, executive director of the Barnett Shale Energy Education Council, an industry group. He praised TCEQ for installing air-monitoring systems and encouraged the agency to install more.

He said the air-monitoring sites in Dish and other locations have shown that the air near gas drilling sites is safe.

And let us get this straight, TCEQ is now concerned about the air in Tarrant County but the head of the Energy Education Council is not.  Isn't he paid not to be? 
 
Read about the TCEQ meeting in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram here.

Someone's listening?!

Finally.  Congratulations to Jim Ashford!  Read the article about ethics in Fort Worth, in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

It may be an inherent conflict of interest to allow gas company employees to serve on committees that oversee their industry, the city's Ethics Review Committee ruled Thursday.


The panel made the ruling in a case about the makeup of the city's Air Quality Study Committee, which was formed to examine potentially toxic emissions at natural gas sites.

If upheld, the ruling could have far-reaching ramifications because most of the city's regulations on gas drilling were written by committees that included representatives from the gas industry. At least one of the companies plans to appeal the ruling to the full Fort Worth City Council.

The council appointed the air quality committee in March to find a way to determine the level of toxic emissions around gas sites, and its findings could lead to new gas drilling regulations in the city.

The 10-member committee includes three representatives from major drilling companies: Devon Energy, XTO Energy and Chesapeake Energy.

Chesapeake Vice President Julie Wilson said the company will vigorously appeal.

Jim Ashford, an east Fort Worth resident who is suing Chesapeake over noise and air pollution from a compressor station near his house, filed the ethics complaint in the spring. He said it was improper for the gas companies to have representatives on a committee that is studying pollution potentially caused by their industry.

Holy Cow - Update

Earlier this month, we asked if it was going to take kids getting killed to get the truth.  Looks like the answer is yes.

Is the Texas Railroad Commission railroading another "study"?  Read about it on TXSharon.

Sounds like...

The FW Weekly wants to know how you get public records from the Tarrant Regional Water District.  Yeah, us too. 

Cry me a river. Maybe the Trinity River, where the Tarrant Regional Water District, in the midst of a controversial jillion-dollar project, is equally stingy about releasing public records.

They also want you to know about the EPA fracing meeting in Texas.  Don't miss it!

Finally (well, not really — there’s always more on this topic, but Static is out of ink), the EPA has scheduled four “public information meetings” on its proposed study of gas drilling and water pollution. They run from July 8 to Aug. 12, but only the first one is in Texas (“fraccing” having become a major concern in many parts of the country), and the results will help determine the design of the study. The EPA wants “stakeholders” to register at least 72 hours before the meeting, which begins at 6 p.m. at the Hilton Fort Worth, 815 Main St. For more information, check the agency’s web site at www.epa.gov. And then go plant your stake.