HB 3105, Relating to the applicability of the Private Real Property Rights Preservation Act to certain governmental actions, is designed to do one thing, and one thing only - destroy local control of drilling. It is designed to take away the power and ability of cities to regulate drilling in their jurisdiction. Big Gas made its impact felt.
The bill made it out of committee on a 5-1 (3 absent) vote. Myra Crownover voted against the bill in committee. I would like to think that it is because of the fact that a large portion of her district is in the Barnett Shale, and that she recognizes that people are really angry about what is happening to the air and to their health and safety. Corinth's Gas Well Ordinance was called "one of the area’s toughest gas drilling ordinances"... HB 3105 if passed would completely eviscerate it.
Currently the bill is sitting in the calendars committee. It has not been considered yet, so if it doesn't make it out of calendars, then as a stand alone bill, it is dead. It could still yet make it out of calendars - typically if a bill is resolved to not be placed on a calendar, then it appears as "considered in calendars" in the bill actions list. So, contact the members of calendars committee and suggest it would be best for this never to see the light of day.
If it does make it out of calendars, it can still be stopped on the floor. That requires people interested in stopping this across Texas contact their representatives and urge them to vote no.
Even then we have to keep an eye out for amendments being added to other bills that would perform the same function as this bill. It's a lot of work, but if this gets passed into law, the cities will no longer be able to protect their citizens from unregulated drilling.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment