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My statement to the Monroe County Commission, the evening that “Stand up for Monroe floated their proposal for a local “Natural Rights” ordinance:

First, I wish to thank the County Commissioners for hearing me today.

As the group calling itself “Stand Up for Monroe” apparently implicitly recognizes, their proposed ordinance would contradict WV State law, which permits the development of our natural gas resource using modern technology, including hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”).
The anti -fracking movement has advocated various bans, moratoria and other obstructions to gas production in West Virginia. None of these were adopted by our legislature and there is no provision in the law authorizing any county or local government to impose such measures.
To the contrary, the Monongalia County Circuit Court has said that by authority of statute, the WVDEP “fully occupies” the law regulating fracking and that, “When a state law fully occupies a particular area of legislation … no local ordinances will be permitted to contravene it.” The Court then held: “Accordingly, this court concludes that the ordinance (attempting to ban fracking) passed by the City of Morgantown, is preempted by the State legislation and is invalid!”

The County Commission has already done all it can reasonably and lawfully do, to mitigate
the public burden associated with natural gas extraction here, by entering good-faith negotiations with Gordy Oil Company, which culminated in a memorandum of understanding whereby Gordy agreed to go beyond the requirements of the law in its operations.

The proposed ordinance would betray that agreement.

The rationale for the ordinance rests upon a theory called “rights based”, which is described as, among other things, a way to “prevent corporations from overriding the rights of the people, communities and nature”.

No corporation is “overriding this person’s (my) rights” by offering to buy the natural gas I own beneath my land, which I willingly accepted, as did thousands of other citizens in Monroe County. In fact, it is the proposed ordinance that purports to override those rights, because prohibiting hydraulic fracturing would effectively preclude gas production from the Marcellus and Utica Shales underlying Monroe County.

Because the proposed ordinance is a priori invalid under state law, because it would betray the County Commission’s agreement with Gordy, and because it would unlawfully interfere with my rights as a lessor, I deny that it would serve me as a citizen of Monroe County, in any way.

RD Blakeslee, Union,WV