Above Photo: FB/ Allen Hallmark
They protested against the Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline
SALEM, Ore. (KOIN) — Hundreds of demonstrators marched to the Oregon State Lands building Monday afternoon to demand Gov. Kate Brown stop a pipeline project for the state.
The demonstrators are angry and worried about a possible natural gas pipeline, 231 miles long crossing rivers, streams, public land and private land from Klamath Falls to Coos Bay.
The Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline consists of a 231-mile, 36-inch diameter pipeline, with a capacity of up to 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day.
The march through Salem ended at the Oregon Department of State Lands where protesters staged a sit-in to demand action from government officials to stop the Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline.
Several years ago, John Clark got a knock on his door from a Canadian company that wants to build the pipeline.
“They say they are going to put a pipeline through your property,” Clark told KOIN 6 News.
So far, though, the federal government has denied the Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline a permit. But the company is appealing as the political landscape in both Oregon and DC changes.
Protesters said they’re frustrated “by the many extensions given to the project’s Canadian proponent by the State of Oregon.”
The Oregon State Lands Department keeps delaying a decision on giving the builders a permit. Some Native Americans told KOIN 6 News it’s a battle similar to the Dakota Access Oil pipeline.
“We are now where Standing Rock was 8 years ago,” Frankie Myers with the Yurok Indian Tribe told KOIN 6 News. “They’re trying to push the permit process through and if we don’t stop it, that’s where we will be in the next decade.”
”Now is the time to say no. No to pipelines, no to fracking and no to international exportation of our natural resources,” Molli Myers, Karuk Tribal member with the Klamath Justice Coalition, said in a statement. “Like the Native people from Standing Rock we are fighting for our people, our river and our cultural resources which are under direct threat from pipeline development.”
Opponents of the project said officials have the information and authority to deny this project using the Clean Water Act and Oregon’s fill and removal statutes.