My Letter to the Arkansas Senate on AGRICULTURE, FORESTRY & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Senators,
Please read this article from Friday, March 13, 2009 on: Water Pollution from Shale Gas Drilling.
(I will also give you hard copies of this article on Monday.)
THE TIME TO INTERVENE IS NOW.
Why haven't any of these departments come forward on this issue?
1. Arkansas Department of Health
2. Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission
3. Arkansas Department on Environmental Quality
4. Arkansas Pollution, Control and Ecology Board
5. Arkansas Natural Resources Commission
Perhaps the competing budgets of these many organizations with similar functions have lead them to "Not look a gift horse in the mouth?"-- the "gift horse" being the Fayetteville Shale. The competing budgets of the above mentioned organizations remind me of the time when several state colleges, also competing for shrinking budget dollars, "looked the other way" by not allowing me to debate other candidates for Governor although I was on the ballot. It also reminds me that when colleges are desperate for money, they lessen academic integrity- like when the Community College in Hope got $1,000,000 for a new library from SWEPCO and quickly followed up with a "clean coal" summit which purposefully excluded environmental groups who publicly petitioned for inclusion- such as the Sierra Club and Audubon Arkansas. Another example occurred last October during a "Shale Summit" at UCA that included only gas company executives, construction companies and bankers.
We have too many regulatory agencies and too many colleges competing for ever shrinking dollars. The result is that the quality of work is sacrificed for increasingly short financial return on investment. This fact is not conscious malpractice; it is natural human defense mechanisms. People are subconsciously protecting their careers, pension funds, etc. The result is that we are increasingly sacrificing ARKANSAS WATER QUANTITY AND QUALITY for inversely exponential short financial return on investment. This is entropy in a system gone wild.
Any legislation regarding increased power for the Oil and Gas Commission should be treated as an opportunity for clarification, elucidation and accountability.
We have to improve the activities of our regulatory groups so that the idiosyncrasies of personalities do not preclude the enforcement of our laws.
Thank you for your consideration on this incredibly important matter.
Sincerely,
Rod Bryan
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