Don’t we have a stake in the water we drink?

SIGN HERE to urge Gov. Cuomo not to rush fracking through without listening to the people.

Nearly 15,000 people have already signed our emergency petition asking Governor Cuomo to back off the plan to greenlight fracking. Add your voice right away — and ask your friends and neighbors to join you.

When the Department of Environmental Conservation was preparing draft fracking regulations, they did “stakeholder outreach.” But they didn’t call me. They didn’t call you. Guess who they called?

As the Albany-Times Union reports, the DEC secretly shared details of regulations with the oil and gas lobbyists, to seek their feedback. If not for a Freedom of Information Act request, we’d never even have known.

We trust the DEC to look out for all the people of New York. Instead, they gave special access to the fracking lobby.

If the DEC had asked the public for input, we know what they would have heard: we just want our water to stay safe, our communities to stay uncontaminated, and our children to grow up without being exposed to toxic chemicals.

In fact, when the DEC did finally ask what we thought — months later — we told them. 60,000 people submitted public comments. Comments that it seems like the DEC is ignoring.

What did the frackers ask for? Less safety. Fewer penalties for dangerous mistakes. More permission to pollute. They even asked the DEC to “reduce or eliminate radionuclide testing” of runoff water. That’s right, they don’t care whether your water is radioactive.

The frackers want to run this industry with as little regulation as possible, and the DEC seems ready to let them.