Texas

Gulf Coast Refineries: Texas’ Ticking Time Bombs

February 17, 2015 Remington Alessi, www.mintpressnews.com Educate! Oil & Gas, Texas, Worker Rights and Jobs, worker safety

The United Steelworkers aren’t just on strike because of wages. They’re concerned about safe practices, because workers are in constant danger from a corporate culture that does not care for their safety. In Deer Park and Pasadena, Texas, refineries line the ship channel, processing everything from sweet crude to diluted bitumen from tar sands oil. The area makes up the largest network of petrochemical plants in the world. Plant operators act as the last line of defense against industrial disasters, and they are fearful of the results of company decisions to cut costs at the expense of safety. “It’s like working around a bomb,” said one LyondellBasell employee while sitting outside of the Pasadena plant’s gates. The plant itself has not been inspected since 2010, when OSHA found sufficient violations to justify a fine.

Texas Muslim Capitol Day Marred By Anti-Islam Protesters

January 30, 2015 Lauren McGuaghy, www.chron.com Resist! Islamaphobia, Texas

They came out by the hundreds from Dallas, San Antonio and Houston, mostly women and children, girls with silver-bowed shoes and pink owl backpacks. They sang the national anthem and prayed. But less than 20 feet from where the group of Texas Muslims gathered on the steps of the state Capitol in Austin, a small handful of protesters told them exactly how they felt about their visit. "We don't want you here!" shouted one. Others yelled, "Go home," "ISIS will gladly take you" and "remember 9/11." "You don't have to dress that way! Take it off!" came from a woman holding an Israeli flag. "Islam is the war on women!" Earlier in the morning, Rep. Molly White, R-Belton, commented on the gathering.

Activists File Complaint Against Dallas Police

December 3, 2014 Candice Bernd, www.truth-out.org Organize! Dallas, Law, police brutality, Texas

Dallas Communities Organizing for Change (DCOC), a grassroots, Dallas-based police accountability group, has filed an administrative complaint with the Department of Justice's (DOJ) Civil Rights Division alleging that the Dallas Police Department (DPD) has participated in a pattern and practice of excessive use of force against African-Americans and Hispanics, echoing a national trend. According to the complaint, between July 2002 and July 2013, there were 185 police shootings reported by the DPD, with 58 resulting in a fatality. African-American and Hispanic fatalities accounted for 43, or 74 percent, of all lethal police shootings. Thirty-six of the 185 police shooting victims were unarmed.

Texas Oil Regulator Says It Will Not Honor Town’s Vote To Ban Fracking

November 13, 2014 Emily Atkin, www.mintpressnews.com Educate! Energy, Environment, Fracking, Texas

On election day, the town of Denton, Texas, voted by a wide margin to ban fracking within the city limits. Two days later, the chairwoman of Texas’ oil and gas regulator said she would not honor the ban. Texas Railroad Commission Chairwoman Christi Craddick told the Dallas Morning News that she would continue giving permits to oil and gas companies seeking to frack in Denton. Craddick asserted she could override the ban because Denton does not have authority over drilling activity in the state. “It’s my job to give permits, not Denton’s,” Craddick said. “We’re going to continue permitting up there because that’s my job.” Fracking — the process of injecting water, sand and chemicals underground to extract oil and gas from shale formations — has a long history in Denton, one of the most heavily-fracked towns in Texas.

Oil Town Makes History, Residents Say No Fracking

November 6, 2014 Suzanne Goldenberg, www.theguardian.com Resist! Election, Energy, Environment, Fracking, Protests, Texas

The Texas town where America’s oil and natural gas boom began has voted to ban fracking, in a stunning rebuke to the industry. Denton, a college town on the edge of the Barnett Shale, voted by 59% to ban fracking inside the city limits, a first for any locality in Texas. Organisers said they hoped it would give a boost to anti-fracking activists in other states. More than 15 million Americans now live within a mile of an oil or gas well. “It should send a signal to industry that if the people in Texas – where fracking was invented – can’t live with it, nobody can,” said Sharon Wilson, the Texas organiser for EarthWorks, who lives in Denton.

Denton Tells Big Oil To Frack Off

November 3, 2014 Jim Hightower, www.otherwords.org Organize! Climate Change, Energy, Environment, Fracking, Texas

The University of North Texas, best known for its top-notch jazz program and sometimes for its “Mean Green” football team, might soon become known as Frack U. UNT (where I went to college back in the Paleocene Epoch) and the good people of the surrounding city of Denton are at the center of an epochal fight between Big Oil and common sense. Denton, just 30 miles north of Dallas, stands on the frontlines of the growing conflict between frackers and the rest of us. Unbeknownst to nearly all Dentonites (until recently), they sit atop the Barnett shale field, a deposit of natural gas locked a mile and a half underground in ancient rock.

Feds Planning Massive For-Profit Family Detention Center

September 6, 2014 Forrest Wilder, www.texasobserver.org Educate! Criminal Justice and Prisons, Immigration, Obama, Texas

Federal officials are planning a new for-profit family detention lockup for immigrant children and their parents in South Texas. The 2,400-bed “South Texas Family Detention Center”—as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is referring to it—is slated for a 50-acre site just outside the town of Dilley, 70 miles southwest of San Antonio. The detention center is part of the Obama administration’s response to the surge in children and families from Central America crossing the Texas-Mexico border. In a statement to the Observer, ICE spokeswoman Nina Pruneda said the facility was intended “to accommodate the influx of individuals arriving illegally on the Southwest border.” The property is part of Sendero Ranch, a “workforce housing community,” better known in the oil patch as a “man camp” for oilfield workers. Sendero Ranch is owned by Koontz McCombs, a commercial real estate firm connected to San Antonio mogul Red McCombs. Loren Gulley, vice president for Koontz McCombs, said the company is still negotiating the deal but Corrections Corporation of America—the world’s largest for-private prison company—is expected to run the detention center, and Koontz McCombs would lease the existing “man camp” to ICE. A detailed site map provided to Frio County shows a large fenced campus, including both residential housing as well as a gym, chapel and “community pavilions.” The “man camp” has enough space to temporarily house 680 detainees while new structures are being built, ICE spokesman Bryan Cox said.

Louisianans Ask For Protections From Big Oil

August 29, 2014 Jessica Hodge, www.earthjustice.org Create! EPA, Louisiana, Oil, Texas

Twenty-four residents representing eight Louisiana communities traveled to Galena Park, Texas, on August 5, 2014 in support of a refinery rule recently proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that will force petroleum refineries to reduce toxic air emissions. The Deep South Center for Environmental Justice in partnership with Advocates for Environmental Human Rights organized a group of community residents who have suffered both physical and psychological health problems from toxic chemical exposure due to emissions from nearby refineries in their community. There are currently 142 petroleum refineries in the United States. Exposure to toxic air pollutant emissions can cause upper respiratory problems and can increase the risk of developing cancer. Louisiana residents had an opportunity to testify at the public hearing to urge EPA to move forward with stricter refinery emissions standards to control toxic air emissions being released in their communities. Dorothy Felix, president of Mossville Environmental Action Network (MEAN) in Mossville, LA, testified that there are already 14 large industrial plants in her community and Sasol, a gas to liquid plant, wants to build another facility in her community. She said, “In fact, a section of Mossville is being relocated due to ground water contamination.” Residents in her community were tested for dioxin exposure and test results revealed that some Mossville residents had three times the national average of dioxin in their blood levels. Ms. Felix appealed to the EPA to protect them, saying: “You are the agency in place that has the power to protect fenceline communities.We want you to strongly enforce regulations so that we human beings in the current and future generations can have a healthy and safe environment to live in.”

Locked, Loaded, And Ready For School

August 23, 2014 Christopher Hooks, www.texasobserver.org Educate! Education, Guns, Texas

School districts across Texas have had a rough go of things in the last couple years, starting with the Legislature’s $5.4 billion cut to public education funding in 2011. A lot of the state’s schools went on a starvation diet. Chronic underfunding of public education seems to be the state’s new norm. Which has left a lot of schools in Texas scrambling to find ways to pay for the bare necessities themselves. Take tiny Childress and Shamrock ISDs, two districts in the Panhandle that shelled out quite a bit of money—on guns. Childress ISD spent $150,000. The money’s for more than just guns, of course—it’s for guns, and a support system for the guns, reports the Amarillo Globe-News. The nearby town of Shamrock, with a population of 2,000 and a school district enrollment of about 430, paved the way for regional innovation with the installation of gun safes in classrooms, which would let staff members access heat in a hurry. Childress, with a population of a little over 6,100 and a school district enrollment of about 1,100, knew they were on to something good. Childress ISD’s board approved a similar measure last year that allows certain school employees to access firearms kept in safes, [Superintendent Rick] Teran said. The school district devoted $150,000 to the purchase of firearms, safes, practice ammunition, a panic system and training, he said.

Judge Throws Out Texas Family’s Fracking Case

August 16, 2014 David Hasemyer, www.insideclimatenews.org Resist! Fracking, pollution, Texas

A Texas judge has dismissed a million dollar lawsuit filed by a Karnes County, Texas, family who say their lives have been ruined by noxious emissions from oil and gas facilities near their home. District Judge Stella Saxon apparently accepted the argument made by Marathon Oil Corp. and Plains Exploration & Production (PXP) that Mike and Myra Cerny didn't have enough medical and scientific evidence to prove to a jury that they have been sickened by oil field emissions. Marathon applauded the ruling, while the Cernys' attorney said he'll file an appeal. Legal experts say the dismissal could have a chilling effect on others who may be considering legal action against the oil and gas industry. The dismissal in Karnes County stands in stark contrast to a case in Dallas County earlier this year in which a jury awarded $2.9 million to a family who also claimed to be sickened by emissions. That two similar cases could have such different outcomes highlights vagaries of both the justice and regulatory system in Texas, where the oil and gas industry is widely praised and supported. "Judges try to do the right thing but they come at the task with certain preconceptions," said Thomas McGarity, a University of Texas law professor who specializes in environmental and administrative law. "Those preconceptions vary with the sentiments of jurisdictions they represent."

Fracked: The Self-Implosion Of An Industry On The Ropes

August 14, 2014 Adam Briggle, www.truth-out.org Organize! Corporatism, Fracking, Texas

Fracking is the only industrial activity in the city of Denton, Texas that is allowed in residential areas (sometimes less than 200 feet from homes). Not even bakeries are allowed there. Fracking is also the only industry allowed to emit non-disclosed chemicals into the environment. That's why I am helping to lead Frack Free Denton, a citizens' initiative that takes the oh-so-radical step of prohibiting the most toxic, under-regulated and secretive industry from operating the closest to places where children live and play. Normally, this would be the stuff of sane and rational, even boring, adjustments to the city code. But because we are talking about the natural gas industry, lots of rich and powerful folks are tarring us as extremists. One driller said that Denton residents were on a terrorist watch list. The head of the Texas Railroad Commission, a man who is funded by the very industry he supposedly oversees, insinuated that Russia is behind Denton's proposed ban. Frackers regularly buy full-page ads in the local paper accusing us of being unpatriotic fools. They've also carpet bombed social media with ads suggesting we'd run out of lacrosse sticks if we didn't allow fracking in our neighborhoods.

Fracking Companies Fight Families’ Air Pollution Suits

August 14, 2014 David Hasemyer, www.insideclimatenews.org Resist! Fracking, pollution, Texas

Two major oil companies have asked a Texas judge to dismiss a civil lawsuit that could draw new attention to the toxic air emissions from oil and gas production. The lawsuit was filed last year by Mike and Myra Cerny, who say they can't enjoy the use of their home because of the benzene, toluene and other toxic chemicals released from nearby facilities owned by Marathon and Plains Exploration & Production (PXP). The Cernys are using the same argument that helped another Texas family, Bob and and Lisa Parr, win a groundbreaking, $2.9 million judgment against Aruba Petroleum last April: That the emissions created a nuisance that made their lives unbearable. Air emissions are increasingly recognized as a problem in drilling areas throughout United States, with residents complaining of coughing, headaches, nosebleeds, rashes and dizziness. But lawsuits linking gas and oil production to health problems have been considered almost unwinnable, because few scientific studies have been done on how the industry’s emissions might affect human health. Jane Barrett, director of the University of Maryland's Environmental Law Clinic, said that if the Parrs and Cerneys succeed, their cases could change the assumption that ordinary people can't stand up to the industry.

First Hand Experience: Exposing ALEC In Dallas

August 11, 2014 Kit O'Connell, www.mintpressnews.com Resist! ALEC, Corruption, Protest, Texas

We’d gathered at Eddie Deen’s Ranch to interrupt the American Legislative Exchange Council at dinner. I was wearing a pink cowboy hat, temporarily inducted into the CODEPINK Posse, an effort organized by the local branch of the well-known national rabble rousers for peace. About 30 of us stood along the sidewalk outside the Ranch, watched by a half-dozen police officers looking bored, a chatty police detective and a pair of startled horses held by two men dressed as cowboys. Overhead, an airplane circled, towing a warning about corporate corruption. Powerful people in suits laughed at us and snapped smartphone photos as they disembarked from the chartered buses they rode to the Western-themed restaurant. It was July 31 and ALEC was in town for its 41st meeting. After the first of several days of corporate backroom deals at the Hilton Anatole, ALEC’s members wanted to pretend they were cowboys while they ate. The buses kept coming and out poured some of the world’s most powerful: corporate executives, rich investors, state legislators and their families. Though they’d normally disdain public transportation — when they aren’t orchestrating cuts against it in the name of austerity — I imagined the atmosphere on the bus was jovial, as if the “1%” was on a field trip.

Protests As New Arm Of ALEC Is Announced

August 6, 2014 Candice Bernd, www.truth-out.org Resist! ALEC, Journalism, Politics, Privatization, Texas

Two grassroots activists from North Texas locked themselves inside the lobby of the Hilton Anatole in Dallas, Thursday morning, as another two dropped a banner from the upper stories of the hotel to greet lawmakers and corporate officials gathered for the 41st annual meeting of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Protesters Whytney Blythe and Joshua Carmona were removed by hotel security, within about an hour after they chained themselves inside, and released without charges. State legislators and corporate lobbyist members from across the country will sit on task forces designed to review and vote on conservative "model" legislation that will likely travel from the Dallas Hilton Anatole's luxury conference rooms to official state house chambers, as lawmakers often pass off ALEC model bills as their own. ALEC has generated legislation that advances the interests of its corporate members throughout state legislatures in the United States, as has been well documented, by organizations such as the Center for Media and Democracy. More than 98 percent of the organization's funding comes from corporations and corporate foundations, with the infamous petrochemical billionaire brothers, Charles and David Koch of Koch Industries, serving as some of the organization's largest donors.

EPA Non-Responsive On Texas Air Pollution

July 25, 2014 Lisa Song and Jim Morris, www.insideclimatenews.org Organize! EPA, Journalism, pollution, Texas

For more than a year, InsideClimate News and the Center for Public Integrity have been reporting on air pollution caused by the fracking boom in the Eagle Ford Shale of South Texas. Despite hundreds of complaints from residents, many of them about noxious air emissions, we discovered that the state knows almost nothing about the extent of the pollution and rarely fines companies for breaking emission laws. On our 11 trips to Texas we encountered many residents who asked what seemed to be a reasonable question: If a state regulatory agency—in this case the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality—isn't doing much to curb the industry's air pollution, why isn't the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency stepping in? The EPA, after all, is ultimately responsible for enforcing the federal Clean Air Act. In February, after we published our first stories on the Eagle Ford, we began trying to answer that question by seeking on-the-record interviews with EPA officials in Washington, D.C., and Texas. Five months later, no such interviews have been granted. Instead, EPA press officers have told us to put our questions in writing, an increasingly common response from federal agencies under the Obama administration. The process usually goes like this: A journalist calls the press office to schedule an interview but instead is told to submit written questions. Once these are in, a press officer gets answers from scientists or other officials and then crafts a written response. In most cases, nobody involved in the process—not even the EPA press officers—will agree to be quoted by name.

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