If Erie is going to suspend fracking operations in town, that decision will have to wait at least two weeks.
On Tuesday night, the town’s Board of Trustees spent hours debating whether to enact a yearlong moratorium on oil and gas operations, but ultimately voted to put that decision off for two weeks.
On Jan. 27, the board will revisit the possibility. Oil and gas companies Encana and Anadarko have promised to hold off on seeking any new drilling permits from Erie between now and then.
In the meantime, town leaders say they hope to bring together all key stakeholders in the matter. That meeting could take place as soon as Wednesday, though a date was not set as of late Tuesday night.
Tuesday’s moratorium ordinance proposed to bring an end — for the time being, at least — to a long-term Encana project that began on paper more than two years ago with a memorandum of understanding between the town and the company and was to culminate in the drilling of 13 wells. Those wells, to be set west of the Vista Pointe subdivision and north of Vista Ridge, had been in the works for more than two years prior to the trustees’ official site approval last summer.
Among the trustees who were supportive of the moratorium, the general thinking was that more time is needed to better understand an issue that can harm quality of life for residents.
“I really feel like our No. 1 job here is to protect our citizens,” Mayor Tina Harris said. “They’ve been asking us to do it. We’ve been saying we’d do it. We need to walk the walk.”
In supporting a moratorium, Harris was joined by trustees Scott Charles and Jennifer Carroll. Dan Woog, Mark Gruber, Janice Moore and Waylon Schutt voted in favor of a two-week pause.
“This is not a moratorium against the oil and gas industry,” Harris clarified. “It’s not me saying I don’t like Encana. It’s not me saying I need to punish the oil and gas industry. It’s me saying I want the state to hear that we need more local control. Municipalities need more local control. It’s not right that we can’t control something that is happening within our borders.”
Encana had planned to split the operation between two clumps: five wells at one site (Pratt) and eight at another (Waste Connections). By the Pratt site, which sits less than 700 feet away from some Vista Ridge homes, dozens of residents had complained of relentless noise and a generally degraded quality of life while drilling operations, which ran from just before Thanksgiving until just before Christmas, were ongoing.
During a lengthy public comment section at Tuesday’s meeting — dominated more than 2-to-1 by moratorium supporters — 19 residents spoke of their negative experiences in living with the Encana project.
“None of my family members had a good night sleep,” said Vista Ridge’s Christaan van Woudenberg. “When I purchased my home in 2007, I never imagined I’d see such intense industrial activity so close to my doorstep.
“I’m really sad that when I tell people I live in Erie, they recognize our little town where all that fracking is happening.”
Many residents said their homes vibrated as a result of nearby drilling. One said his wife experienced chronic migraines. Another said that her young children didn’t sleep soundly for a month.
“I visited a home (in Vista Ridge) during the drilling, and it was absurd what I witnessed,” said Trustee Scott Charles, during a comment late in the meeting. “We would be doing a disservice to our residents if we did not enact this moratorium.”
Several people said Tuesday that they were looking into moving out of Erie.
“We’re thinking about selling our dream home,” resident Scott Cardwell said. “This (home) is the biggest investment of my whole life, and I can’t sleep in my own home because of this.”
“My house is going to be going up for sale,” added resident Ani Hulse. “This is kind of the last straw for me. I didn’t buy in for Erie being a pro-industry town. I really thought it was pro-family.”
“I think it’s really unfair,” Hulse continued, “that we allowed a corporation to come into our town and do this . … They’re coming in and making a profit, and I’m the one suffering.”
At the onset of the trustees’ Aug. 12 meeting, at which the site was approved, Harris read a statement suggesting she and the rest of the board had little authority to stop Encana, even if it wanted to. The trustees, Harris said that night, could only evaluate Encana’s proposal on four criteria: whether setbacks between wells and homes were within state law; whether the access roads to the site were adequate; whether the site had appropriate fencing; and whether the colors on the site facilities were good aesthetic fits.
“We know you’re not going to be happy, but we have to approve or disapprove based on those four criteria,” Harris told the crowd at that meeting.
At Tuesday’s meeting, Mayor Pro Tem Mark Gruber described the town board as “wearing handcuffs” during those negotiations.
Since that approval, and in response to a slew of formal complaints filed by affected residents with the Colorado Oil & Gas Conservation Commission, Encana added numerous sound mitigation measures at the Pratt site in December, including installing a heavier material onto the sound wall closest to homes. Those efforts made little practical difference, residents said.
On Dec. 26, Encana announced it would cease drilling until a permanent solution could be reached.
In voting for the moratorium, the Erie trustees would agree not only to hold off for one year on accepting land use applications related oil and gas, but also to investigate how other towns and cities handle fracking activities, and to consider new ordinances coming out of Gov. Hickenlooper’s task force.
The task force, formed in September in an effort to establish clearer state and local regulations around oil and gas production, is expected to report its recommendations to Hickenlooper’s office no later than Feb. 27.
