What a medical worker gag order looks like by the time COGA and the Colorado Petroleum Association get done with it. Oh, they actually wrote it.

http://cogcc.state.co.us/Form35Adoption/Comments_CPA-COGA.pdf

Health care workers - The Coalition of Concerned Health Care Professionals is calling for the governor and industry to immediately suspend the gag order (COGCC Form 35) that does not allow medical professionals to disclose the composition of frack fluid in the event of human contamination. Please call the Governor and make this demand. Weld county health care workers will be assisted in your doing so. The Governor's number is: 

303-866-2885
800-283-7215

If you are a health care worker who would like to become involved in the effort to protect public health and fight hydraulic fracturing, please message our FB page.

Oil and Water on the Wattenberg

Oil and Water on the Wattenberg

Cliff Willmeng

Lafayette, Colorado
September 21, 2013

The crisis for the Colorado Oil and Gas Association that last week’s floods created is now, thanks to community members and their cameras, set firmly onto the world stage. For the last seven days international media attention saw the immensity of the Weld County disaster, and those terrifying images of flood water colliding with oil and gas infrastructure are now the property of history, never to be taken back.

                                                                                   

The industry will now engage in damage control to the best of its abilities, which will mean attempting to reassure the public and investors that it is in command, and that every effort is being created to assess, contain, and mitigate the catastrophic damage we all witnessed unfold. COGA spokeswoman Tisha Schulller is making daily statements to this effect as she is paid to do, and Colorado’s Governor John Hickenlooper spent at least part of his day Saturday tweeting about the cantaloupe he was eating, confident that “...the several small spills that we've had have been very small, relative to the huge flow of water". Anadarko, a multinational petroleum corporation with annual revenue of over $14 billion and owner of some of the first major official spills into the South Platte River, volunteered $300,000 toward the flood relief. In the mean time, chemicals trail unmitigated into the environment of Weld County and beyond, and prior to even minimal environmental assessment, Encana announced that 150 flooded wells that had been shut down are now up and flowing again.

We can’t see that workers on the ground are being given full personal protection gear, as anyone in a hazmat suit would indicate there is something poisonous involved in gas and oil production. And we don’t know if the oil and gas industry will take some of its massive profits to pay field workers while they are off the clock. We can make an educated guess, however, that the industry CEO’s, many that receive yearly compensation in the tens of millions of dollars, are sitting dry and comfortable.  So at least that is not a concern.

The industry that’s operations regularly pollute our beautiful State will now expect the people of Weld County and Colorado to believe that it is a credible source of information and environmental action. And while we are weighing that idea out, five Colorado communities that are attempting to assert some degree of democratic control over oil and gas operations on the ballot this November will continue to be harassed by industrial public relations groups and corporate law firms. COGA and the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission have refused to drop their lawsuit against the people of Longmont for voting to ban fracking in 2012, and the gag order preventing medical professionals and first responders to disclose the composition of fracking fluids in the event of human contamination still sits confidently on the legislative books. These priorities have withstood the floods.

All of this is the direct result of the colonization of our lands by the oil and gas industry, and a government that acts as its political arm. But as the hydrocarbons drip into the soil, the EPA shrugs its collective shoulders, and Colorado’s floodwaters carry into Nebraska and beyond, our communities will continue to fill in where government, gas, and oil leave human health and safety behind. The tragedy that we all are a part of asks us to strengthen our resolve on every level. And where it comes to the discussion of mineral rights versus public safety and democratic control of our world, this will be one area that does not escape the industry, the people of Colorado, or John Hickenlooper. Colorado will be changed by these enormous events to be sure, and it will be the incredible efforts of our people that will place us all on higher ground.

Cliff Willmeng

cliff.willmeng@gmail.com

http://youtu.be/ayWX_CyXsqE

For those with too much money, or maybe that just want send some our way. Flood relief, ballot initiatives against fracking, and our incredible supporters.

Flood Relief
http://boulderfloodrelief.org/

Ballot Initiatives
East Boulder County United, Lafayette Community Rights Act to Ban Fracking
EastBoCoUnited.org
Frack-Free Colorado
http://www.frackfreecolorado.com/
Our Broomfield
OurBroomfield.org
Protect Our Loveland

ProtectOurLoveland.com

Citizens for a Healthy Fort Collins

http://www.healthyfoco.com/sponsor

Our Supporters:
Fractivist:
http://fractivist.blogspot.com/
Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund
http://www.celdf.org/
EcoFlight
http://ecoflight.org/