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Petition drive continues
By Chris Roark, croark@starlocalnews.com
In six weeks, Southlake residents will know whether they will have the option of making changes to the city’s oil and gas drilling ordinance.
The Citizens for Property Rights (CPR), a local general political action committee, is proposing changes to the ordinance, which was passed in November.
CPR is circulating a petition in hopes of receiving enough signatures from registered voters that support various changes. CPR must receive 3,346 signatures by 5 p.m. May 29. If that occurs, the city council has 60 days to accept the changes as presented by CPR or put the issue on the ballot for a November special election.
Gordon Aalund, a strong advocate for the current ordinance, is not one of the petition supporters.
Houser and his group argue that the new ordinance has gone overboard on certain restrictions and mandates. The proposal calls for 25 modifications.
Among those are to lower the bond amount gas drilling companies must post for vehicles. Currently, the ordinance requires a $50 million bond.
“We have trucks driving up and down Hwy. 114 and Southlake Boulevard, and they don’t have that policy,” Houser said.
Houser also pointed to a requirement in which a gas vehicle that goes off an allowable road must pay a $2,000 fine. He said other 18-wheelers are only fined $193.
“We’ve seen problems, and we want protection,” Aalund said.
Houser said another key item is to reduce the distance in which a driller notifies a residence of upcoming project from half a mile to 1,000 feet.
“There are no known gas blasts that have ever hurt anyone beyond 300 feet,” Houser said. “So why are they making companies notify residents from half a mile out?”
Aalund said the current ordinance is strong and was done after carful consideration of safety concerns.
“So much has changed in the last five years about drilling in neighborhoods, so the ordinance needed to be updated,” Aalund said. “They approved the ordinance after working on it for about two years. “We had meetings with the city council, P&Z and with citizens. And from that, we learned a lot. The city passed the moratorium to take in all that information and then updated the ordinance.”
Houser said he is concerned about the safety of residents as well. But he said a modified ordinance would keep things in perspective.
“In 60 years, there have been four deaths related to gas drilling in the Tarrant County quadrant, which is made up of six counties,” Houser said. “And those were all because of equipment malfunction, and none of the deaths were residents.”
Houser also compares the four gas drilling-related deaths to 178 annual deaths in Tarrant County from drunk driving.
“We just need to keep the perspective of safety versus major danger,” Houser said.
Aalund said this is CPR’s third attempt to get the ordinance repealed. The first attempt was too late to get the item on the ballot for the November special election. The second attempt failed because of an incorrect process.
“To me, it’s going in the wrong direction,” Aalund said of CPR’s attempt. “The ordinance was updated to protect the community by using the knowledge that we had gained for the last few years. We looked at the ordinances from our neighboring communities, such as Flower Mound and Colleyville, and we learned from that. So now our ordinance is probably one of the best in North Texas.”
Aalund said another component CPR wants to change is the variance process.
“The problem is that the variance affects the whole community,” Aalund said. “There would be nothing that the city council or P&Z could do because they would have agreed amongst themselves to grant the variance.”
As far as setbacks, Houser said the only change CPR is recommending is not allowing the council to override a waiver a property owner files if he/she lives within 1,000 feet of a pad site.
“The city can negate that under the new ordinance,” Houser said. “But if any other business wants a waiver, the city can’t negate it.”
Houser said the safety requirements incorporated into the modifications are the same as what was part of the Milner application.
Aalund said those who want to change the ordinance aren’t thinking of the surrounding neighbors.
“They don’t think that drilling affects anyone in the community except for the property owners and the mineral owners,” Aalund said. “This caters to the driller. It doesn’t make sense to let a PAC [political action committee] rewrite our ordinance with handpicked modification.”
Aalund said he has an issue with the petition process in general. He said the residents who are being approached to sign the petition aren’t being given the information they need. He said to fully understand the situation, residents would have to compare the old ordinance and the new ordinance.
“Nobody is going to read about 200 pages to make a decision,” Aalund said.
Houser said the petition is within Texans’ rights.
“We’re not reckless, and we’re not renegades,” Houser said. “We’re just legal, tax-paying citizens who are complying with the Texas Constitution.”
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