Community and Environmental Rights

A lot of people don't think of "the environment" has being owed rights. "What? Give trees rights?" You might think it's something to scoff at but there's a long tradition of recognizing nature as being owed something other than a numerical dollar value for its extractive potential, its ability to be turned into a chair, a car, or a hand-held device, or its value as property.

In 1948, Aldo Leopold wrote "The Land Ethic" in A Sand County Almanac. He believed that things were owed moral status if they are part of the community. He wrote,

All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts. His instincts prompt him to compete for his place in that community, but his ethics prompt him also to co-operate (perhaps in order that there may be a place to compete for).

The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land.

These simple lines have infused much of the environmental movement's ethics for 60 years. They resonate to some degree in the work of environmentalists' and environmental groups' rhetoric to varying degrees. And some take it more seriously than others.

Today on the show, we will be talking to Ben Price of the Community and Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF). They argue that the escalating ecological crises we are living in has resulted from decisions made powerful people in our major institutions. They argue that "sustainability will never be achieved by leaving those decisions in the hands of a few – both because of their belief in limitless economic production and because their decisions are made at a distance from the communities experiencing the impact of those decisions." What's the answer? In part, it's to change the power dynamics by invoking the rights of communities to determine their futures. The community is that broadest community including the environment, or what Leopold called the land.

Price helped craft State College's Community and Environmental Bill of Rights and Fracking Ban so successfully fought for by GroundswellPA and passed in 72% to 28% landslide. But recently passed legislation that has resulted in Act 13 of the Oil and Gas Law threatens local ordinances to regulate natural gas drilling operations. Will the State College referendum stand? Will the lawsuit against the state by seven Pennsylvania municipalities succeed? Do we need a revolution against what some call a corporate kleptocracy? We'll ask Price these and other questions.

Call in with questions this afternoon from 4-5 pm: (814) 865-9577. You can also join us on Facebook and Twitter as well.

A wellspring for Groundswell Pa

Last week we had Braden Crooks of Groundswell PA on the show. They're arguing for an Environmental Bill of Rights and they are filming the whole movement.

Check it out:



Contribute here to help them document it.

Today's show: Groundswell and Outrage [Updated]

Today at 4 pm, we'll be airing our first show of the fall season. It will be as fresh and local as we can make it.

Braden Crooks, founder of Groundswell will be on to discuss the what and the why of an Environmental Bill of Rights and a ban on hydraulic fracturing proposed for popular vote in State College, Pennsylvania. [For more see last week's blog post.] What rights does the other-than-human environment deserve? What are our responsibilities to it? What are our responsibilities to future generations of people and their living places and the organisms and systems that will support them? It's no small thing to wrap your head around.


After the 4:30 break we'll be joined by Iris Marie Bloom of Protecting Our Waters. She is one of the principle organizers of Shale Gas Outrage rally and demonstration and the Freedom From Fracking conference this Wednesday, September 7th in Philadelphia. They write,

This demonstration is in response to the Marcellus Shale Coalition’s conference in Philadelphia on Sept. 7th and 8th. CEOs from major fracking companies will be plotting to expand their poisonous operations in PA, NY, OH, MD, WV, VA, and NJ. Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett and former governors Tom Ridge and Ed Rendell will be speaking in support of the industry. Dubbed “Shale Gas Insight,” this is not only a key trade show for the industry, but also a brazen expression of its political muscle.

Today, Bloom will give us the rundown about what we can expect next in the continued wrangling over the natural gas rush in Pennsylvania.

Sustainability Now's Peter Buckland was at the demonstration on Wednesday [read here], doing interviews and getting the inside scoop. People from across the commonwealth were there demanding change, all while being called liars or hysterical by the gas industry.

Perhaps Groundswell's Environmental Bill of Rights is the wave of the future for communities seeking some respite from natural resource extraction, habitat fragmentation, and pollution. Bolivia, following in the footsteps of Ecuador, is set to pass a historic Law of Mother Earth that would grant other-than-human nature equal rights. Is State College next?

Listen this Friday from 4-5 pm on The Lion 90.7 fm. Feel free to call in at 865-9577.

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Here is a copy of the Environmental Bill of Rights itself.

An Environmental Bill of Rights for State College, PA

On Tuesday August 30th at 11 am, Braden Crooks of Groundswell will be talking to press at Schlow Memorial Library about the Environmental Bill of Rights appearing on the popular ballot in State College, PA this November 8th.
Yesterday, he wrote the following to supporters:

If passed, a Community Environmental Bill of Rights and Natural Gas Drilling Ban will mark a dramatic turning point in the operations, governance, scope and sovereignty of the Borough of State College. By recognizing the environment as something other than just property, Environmental Rights alter the legal perception of our environment in a way that has remained unchanged in the history of Western Civilization, until now. Local Rights, like the right to Local Self-Government, alter the role of a local government in America from a tertiary role behind the state, to a Primary Democratic Institution, capable of empowering its citizens to make decisions about what can and cannot happen within the boundaries of their community. Finally, we will ban the commercial extraction of Natural Gas within the borough; a preemptive and proactive measure, designed to ensure urban drilling cannot occur in the Utica Shale under State College and meant as a powerful demonstration of the kind of decisions our community is now capable of making.

If you'd like to learn more, you can visit Groundswell's Facebook page here. Better yet, listen to our show on Friday September 9th when we will be talking to Braden Crooks for the whole show and a segment with Iris Marie Bloom from Protecting Our Waters on activism across the state on natural gas development.

What do you think of environmental rights? What are your responsibilities?

Groundswell for environmental rights

Want an environmental bill of rights in your area?

Braden Crooks thinks communities need them. Until August 8th, he's working in State College, Pennsylvania to get an Environmental Bill of Rights on the popular ballot in the borough this fall. Groundswell believes that state and federal government are unduly influenced - some might say polluted by - industrial corporate power brokers who damage land, ruin air, toxify water, and reap enormous profits at communities' expense. The best option is to declare this "a civil rights issue as much as an environmental problem. As we move toward environmental and energy crises on a global scale we will build sustainable places where we live. We deserve the right to do so." State College? A more sustainable place to live?

According to statecollege.com,

The measure, if approved through a popular vote, would revise the borough home-rule charter to underscore borough residents' rights to clear air and clean water -- rights already prescribed under the state constitution.

It also would say that residents have a right to sustainable energy; that ecosystems have the rights to clean air and water; that future gas drilling is banned within the borough; and that any "non-sustainable energy production" would be persona non grata in State College proper.

The effort has already gained support from borough Mayor Elizabeth Goreham and some Borough Council candidates, including incumbents Peter Morris and Theresa Lafer and challenger Sarah Klinetob. But to get on the November ballot, Crooks, 23, and his Groundswell colleagues will need to gather just more than 700 petition signatures by Aug. 8.

Only borough residents may sign the petition.

Have you signed yet? If you haven't, why not?

Learn more about Groundswell at their website or their Facebook page and contact them to learn more.

'The Interview' with Mary McConnell

Last week, DotEarth blogger Andrew Revkin told a Penn State audience that on the balance, he believed that the proliferation of information on the internet will go toward good, true, and accurate information. We certainly hope so. In that vain of hope, we offer this tragic piece of on-the-ground citizen journalism.

The Bedford Free Press has posted Mary McConnell's story as a property owner in Bedford Country. Her property sits on the Marcellus Shale where Columbia Oil & Gas is drilling. She has been facing an incredible maze of gas corporation wrangling, governmental and legal mess, and the despoliation of her land and water. She has to sleep with a gas mask because her house is full of methane.

The email lists that have been circulating these videos are full of shock on one hand and almost eye-rolling and yawns because stories like this are business as usual. Even among activists, these stories cease to shock. Their sheer persistence, pervasiveness, and even the fat that they seem to be more frequent isn't shocking anymore.







Who has been irreparably damaged?

Over the past several months we've talked to people who don't believe that we live in a democracy anymore. Some of them, Patrick Walker and Rosa Eberly to name two, have argued that we live in a Gasocracy - a people under a government by the gas companies and for the gas companies. Whether that view is correct or not, there are petitions out there now to impeach Tom Corbett precisely because of the new administration's collusion with gas companies. What do you think? Who should be at the government's helm?

Addendum:

Today is the meeting of Governor Tom Corbett's Marcellus Shale Commission that she spoke of. There is a contingent of activists going down today. We will be following up on that story with reports from activists who attend.

Hydraulic fracturing and human rights

The following is a letter submitted by the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Columbia Environmental Law Clinic on human rights abuses created by hydraulic fracturing. As recent reports about produced water from hydraulic fracturing get more traction, we might see lawsuits appear. This provides a new view on the matter for many. The piece was originally posted at FrackTracker.

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The Center for Constitutional Rights and Columbia Environmental Law Clinic submit this letter to provide background on hydraulic fracturing in the United States. The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. CCR is based in New York but works throughout the United States and internationally to promote and protect human rights. Supervised by clinical faculty, Columbia Environmental Law Clinic students represent local, regional and national environmental and community organizations working to solve critical environmental challenges facing the New York metropolitan region as well as other parts of the world. The Clinic is part of a team of lawyers from local, state and national organizations who bring their legal resources to address impacts of gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale, a shale formation that cuts across New York and Pennsylvania. This joint letter with background and recommendations identifies substantial deficiencies in the U.S. Government’s regulation and monitoring hydraulic fracturing.

In the last several decades the United States has experienced political and economic pressure to decrease its dependence on foreign fossil fuels and increase domestic fossil fuel production. New technological developments have allowed the fossil fuel industry to extract natural gas from shale resources previously thought too expensive and difficult to tap. One such development, hydraulic fracturing, has been used in the industry for over 60 years and is now utilized in around 90 percent of the nation’s oil and gas wells.¹ The process involves injecting water, chemicals and natural materials into the well to release trapped gases. Unfortunately, government regulators and industry leaders have historically ignored the substantial health and welfare costs associated with the process.² Government regulators and industry leaders have historically ignored the substantial health and welfare costs associated with the process. Residents living in areas near fracturing sites have higher incidents of cancer and have reported that water itself is often discolored, pungent and contains bubbles because of the high levels of methane gas.³...

Read the rest here.

Questions of animal rights and sustainability

Veterinarian Colleges has posted a top 45 list of animal advocacy blogs. They note that the attention to animal rights movement has exploded in recent years. The internet has brought more people into the mix. Citing Charles Darwin, they write, “The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man." Check out the list.

The animal rights movement and sustainability movements have some considerable overlap, primarily regarding farming and food production. Both concern themselves with the ethics of farm to table. Animal rights activists tend to focus on raising the quality of livestock animals' living conditions, often seen as being achievable through free-range pasturing and evolved feeding that most often reduce environmental impacts. The sustainability movement tends to invert that, seeing better farm-environmental relationships as the focus - often noting how much less fossil fuel can go into small-scale organic farming - and animal welfare being the secondary concern.

This is a win-win in most cases. On Sustainability Now we've seen these movements converge in several of our guests. Several are vegetarians for reasons on both sides of the animal well-being + reduced (and sometimes restorative) environmental impacts. We have had two guests, Johnathan Lynch and Christopher Uhl, use the term Ahimsa - "no harm" - as their definition of sustainability. Animal and human welfare come into play in such a definition. Our sustainable agriculture guests from Pennsylvania Certified Organic and Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture were well-versed in the benefits of treating animals well and using farming techniques that restore the land.

One of the more interesting blogs on the list is the Food Ethics Blog that covers "ethical issues that arise in growing, shipping, processing, selling, regulating, and eating food."

What is your relationship to animals? What do you eat? How was it raised? Even more strangely, how do you feed your pets?

One community split over gas drilling

In Lehman Township, Pennsylvania, the community seems to be divided over the costs and benefits that natural gas drilling will bring. These uncertainties have brought about the "Lehman Township Community Water Rights and Self-Government Ordinance" which has been drawn up Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund and presented by the Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition and signed by nearly half of the community. Citizens Voice reports that the ordinance came up for a vote on Monday, October 18th.

After two hours of discussion on subjects from hazards to residential water wells - including the fact that many of them have contamination issues even without any gas drilling - to whether natural gas drilling lowers property values, the supervisors failed to make a motion to move forward on the ordinance, or even to hold a special meeting for further discussion.

"They completely ignored the will of the people," Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition co-founder Dr. Thomas Jiunta said afterwards, noting that about 510 out of the township's approximately 1,200 residents had signed a petition in favor of the ordinance. "Basically, they (the supervisors) abdicated their responsibility."

But the issue is much more complicated. Regulations across the board, from federal and state levels, might make this ordinance impossible and even unconstitutional. Citizens Voice further reports:

Planning and zoning Solicitor Jack Haley said that in proposing that the rights of corporations be subordinated to those of individuals, proponents of the ordinance forget that Lehman Township itself is a state-chartered corporation.

Making the township and its people the top governing body could have unintendended consequences, Haley said. It could lead to secession not only from the state, but from the U.S., he said. Or it could be used to deny people their rights based on factors such as religion or ethnicity, or, by prohibiting pollution lead to a ban on cars.

This presents an enormous challenge to communities and their rights. Because they are subsumed within larger public bodies (counties, states, and the nation) they are subject to governmental laws, regulations, policies, and procedures that can overrun their local right to self-governance and self-determination. It may be that self-determination is not a right in these cases because, for example, "eminent domain" can be invoked by regulatory departments working with industries (pipelines, roads, or perhaps even gas wells themselves) have determined that it is in the interest of the largest body (state or federal levels) to put in the pipeline, road, or gas well. Local people's interests can lose.

Do you think that the ordinance should be passed?