TAKE ACTION NOW!
Ohio’s state parks and public lands are under attack from Big Oil and Gas!!! get more info at Ohio Sierra Club Check Out Important Environmental Events  The fracking industry has been causing earthquakes in Ohio. So it’s time we caused one of our own. No, not a 4.0-on-the-Richter-scale temblor like the one that shook Youngstown on New Year’s Eve. Instead, we need to aim for an 8.0 on the political scale–we need to shake Columbus with the biggest anti-fracking gathering yet seen in the U.S.! On Sunday, June 17 we’ll be taking over the Ohio statehouse for a people’s assembly that will ‘pass’ legislation that Ohioans need to stop this destructive practice. Click to sign up for action!! You can sign up here, but we need you to do more–please spread the word to friends and colleagues. And get ready for the caravan that will cross the state in mid-May to raise awareness – we’ll have much more on that front soon. In addition to the rally, June 14-16th will be dedicated to training and movement building in Columbus. Fracking is a great mistake for many local reasons. By now we’ve seen its effects on local water supplies: the dead creeks in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, the wells poisoned to the point where residents can’t drink from their faucets. We’ve watched fracking cause the worst air pollution in the U.S., even in Wyoming counties so remote and unpopulated that they lack stoplights. We’ve seen enough to know that communities are as easy to fracture as rocks–that neighbors have been turned against neighbors, and towns blighted as they turn into industrial zones crisscrossed by endless tanker trucks. Gov. Kasich wants to bring all this to Ohio–and why not, since the industry donated $213,000 to his last campaign? His legislation would put only the slightest and most token reins on the industry. Foreign countries (France, say) have banned fracking, and several states including New Jersey and Vermont are poised to prevent the practice; in New York there’s been a de facto four-year moratorium. Ohio is just the latest of many states poised to become a sacrifice zone. But as the nation’s attention turns to Ohio for the election this fall, it is a fitting place to make a stand and say that this process must stop once and for all. Of course we won’t stop here either: other governors, from New York, to Colorado, to even California should be on notice that a powerful movement against fracking is brewing in their backyards. It’s hard to overstate what’s at stake here. We used to think that natural gas might be a help in the fight against climate change–but new studies have demonstrated that so much heat-trapping methane leaks from fracking fields that it may be just as dirty as coal. Ohio is also the dumping ground for fracking wastewater from many other states, and untold thousands of barrels of toxic and radioactive poison is injected underground into dozens wells in Ohio every day. This pollution is an inevitable result of any form of fracking, and if we stop the gas industry from treating Ohio as its personal dump, we may very well succeed in slowing down fracking operations across the northeast region and beyond. Ohio used to be one of the country’s leaders in renewable power–the solar and wind industries were sparking a manufacturing renaissance. But the 18-story gas-drilling rigs along the Ohio River are starting to make life hard for renewable energy: because they don’t have to pay for the environmental damage their drilling does, they can undercut everyone else’s price. “It’s kind of taken the wind out of wind,” one businessman explained. We can’t let that happen–we can’t let Ohio turn into a pincushion, pricked with drill rigs and shaken by earthquakes. If we stay silent, special interests will win; if we speak out together we have a chance. Not a guarantee–the fossil fuel industry is awfully rich. But we’re going to give it a try. Please join us June 14-17 in Columbus! Click to sign up! Bill McKibben – 350.org Josh Fox – Director – Gasland Michael Kieschnick – President, CREDO Action Energy Action Coalition Alison Auciello – Food and Water Watch Katie McChesney – Ohio Student Environmental Coalition Teresa Mills – Center for Health, Environment and Justice Vanessa Pesec – NEOGAP, Network for Oil and Gas Accountability and Protection Ellie Rauh – Fracking Coordinator Buckeye Forest Council Mary Clare Rietz - Coordinator, Ohio Alliance for People & Environment Molly Shea Ohio Fracktion Athens County Fracking Action Group Frack Free Ohio Greenpeace USA Water Defense Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park Please consider signing a petition in support of Ohio offshore wind energy. Click here Living Downstream If you missed the screening checkout the Living Downstream website. Coal Pollution Hurts people Important Information on mercury pollution at Sierra Club national site!! Economic Study Shows that Timber harvest on State lands is a lose/lose situation, read the full story at Study Documentary - Split Estate Every Ohio citizen will be impacted by the drilling boom taking place in our state. Imagine not owning the mineral rights under your land, and an energy company drilling for natural gas 150 feet from your front door. Imagine having little recourse, other than accepting an unregulated industry in your backyard. Split Estate maps a tragedy in the making, as citizens in the path of this drilling boom in the Rocky Mountain West struggle against the erosion of their civil liberties, their communities and their health. Ohioans must learn from what's taking place in other states. Further information or to buy the "Split Estate" DVD, check out http://www.splitestate.com Gasland- The revealing documentary about "Fracking" -- the method of gas and oil drilling now being pushed in Ohio
About Gasland: "The largest domestic natural gas drilling boom in history has swept across the United States. The Halliburton-developed drilling technology of "fracking" or hydraulic fracturing has unlocked a "Saudia Arabia of natural gas" just beneath us. But is fracking safe? When filmmaker Josh Fox is asked to lease his land for drilling, he embarks on a cross-country odyssey uncovering a trail of secrets, lies and contamination. A Pennsylvania town reports that residents are able to light their drinking water on fire after drilling occurred. This is just one of the many absurd and astonishing revelations of a new country called GASLAND. Part verite travelogue, part expose, part mystery, part bluegrass banjo meltdown, part showdown. Further information or to buy the "Gasland" DVD, check out http://www.gaslandthemovie.com/ VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
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If you don't find something that interests you, please get in contact with us to let us know what you might like to do. We welcome new initiatives and activities if someone is willing to take the lead in organizing them!
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