Texas

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.

Petition Circulators Deceive On Fracking

July 14, 2014 BlueDaze Drilling Reform, www.texassharon.com Educate! Democracy, Fracking, Propaganda, Texas

The industry has showered Texans, even those who don’t live in Denton or have mineral holdings there, with more misleading propaganda than I can count. See: Scam Alert… for a post with updated examples of letters sent to mineral owners. Today, Breitling Energy has a full page color ad in the Denton Record Chronicle. Breitling CEO, Chris Faulkner, who lives in Irving nowhere near fracking, recently invited Denton residents to “…fall on their swords for fracking.” Texas Railroad Commissioner, Barry Smitherman, suggests in a letter that could be an audition for a job with The Onion, that Russia is financing the Denton ban effort. We know Smitherman is looking for a job. Texas voters recognized him for the utter failure he is and rejected his bid for promotion to Texas Attorney General. Since I am the one and only person involved in the 100% grassroots effort in Denton who works for an environmental organization, Smitherman must be pointing the finger at me. I have receive no money from Russia but, if I do, the vodka is on me. NOTE: See Denton Councilman Roden’s response to Smitherman. Last week, and oil lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute even claimed democracy is irresponsible.

Texas Sheriff Wants Criminal Charges Filed In Fracking Pollution Case

July 10, 2014 David Hasemyer, www.insideclimatenews.org Resist! Fracking, Law, pollution, Texas

A Texas waste hauling company that is already facing civil charges for a March accident that spread toxic drilling waste along a rural road could also be facing criminal charges. Karnes County Sheriff Dwayne Villanueva said he will ask county prosecutors to file a criminal complaint against On Point Services LLC after the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) and the Texas Railroad Commission close their civil cases against the company. "We are prepared to ask the district attorney's office to review the case for action," Villanueva said. "There are two different levels of enforcement here: the civil by the state and the criminal by the county." The incident occurred March 10 when investigators say 1,260 gallons of liquid waste from an On Point truck coated eight miles of roadway near the rural communities of Falls City and Hobson. Roads were closed for three days and the Texas Department of Transportation conducted a costly cleanup. The incident highlights the growing problem of how to dispose of the billions of gallons of contaminated fluids left over from the nation's hydraulic-fracturing or fracking boom.

Why Americans Become Activists When Fracking Comes To Town

April 29, 2014 Alex Halperin, www.america.aljazeera.com Resist! Activism, Fracking, Texas

The process of extraction turns the land into an industrial landscape: There’s the noisy drilling and 18-wheeler trucks that transport millions of gallons of chemical-infused water that’s later shot into wells. After the frack they carry “flowback” from the wells that can contain radioactive matter. That waste fluid is stored indefinitely in injection wells, which some believe increase the risk of earthquakes. The industry’s position is that after the nuisance of drilling and fracking, gas wells quietly pump money and fuel into the economy. Fracking’s supporters argue that natural gas burns cleanly and will reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil. The gas industry says that fracking supports well-paying jobs. This is a controversial assertion in some states, but less so in Texas, where the importance of oil and gas to the economy is an article of faith. The most contentious questions around fracking involve whether air and water pollution resulting from the process endangers public health. Activists say too little is known about the risks, and are pressing for additional research. The gas, after all, isn’t going anywhere. The many studies done so far are not conclusive. David Brown, a toxicologist who consults for the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project, a nonprofit, says the gas industry hasn’t provided health data on its own workers who labor on gas pads and bear the greatest risk of exposure to toxins. That’s where a proper health study would begin, he says.

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