Onondaga County and the City of New York have both requested a moratorium to protect their citizens against the risk of polluting their water resources from contamination by gas drilling in the Marcellus shale. Both entities have said no
to the potential of long term negative impact to their health and environment. The city of Syracuse relies on Skaneateles lake for its water and New York City relies on the Catskills for its clean water. Why haven't our county governments stepped up to protect the people of the Finger Lakes region also?
The Finger Lakes region needs to be looked at as a big picture scenario as opposed to its individual lakes; for it is the totality that makes our area priceless and independent of all the promises made by the natural gas industry to invigorate the economy with new jobs and income. Over many years of hard work the Finger Lakes region has become a self sustaining economy of New York State. Its water resource holds a high economic value because local visionaries saw the potential of a natural wonder as a means to grow an economy for tourism, farming, wine making, retirement and a clean water resource for swimming, fishing and water sports. Also along with looking at the bigger picture, we need to analyze the impact over several generations and not for just its short term economic benefit. This is an avenue seldom chosen by big business, that is looking for rapid quick profits for its stockholders. Cleaning up after a "gold rush" will require many generations to expend great energy, money and time and in all probability the area will never return to the quality that is present right now.
Let's look at the facts. The Finger Lakes region supplies drinking water to 550,000 lakeside residents and nearly two million people reside in the area bounded by the lakes. Would these residents welcome benzene, toluene, methane and other toxic hydrafracting chemicals in their drinking water? Twenty two million tourists visited the Finger Lakes region in 2009 contributing greatly to the local and state economies. Would we continue to see tourists visit the area in the face of six drilling rigs placed every square mile with thousands of huge tanker trucks navigating our local country roads? The wine industry has worked very hard over several decades to build a self sustaining economy and in 2009
contributed $3.75 billion to the New York State economy. This number is significant because natural gas drilling in 2008 contributed only $2.2 billion to the Pennsylvania Economy. By comparison, would drilling be worth the risk of losing a successful wine industry? Would the local wine industry continue to thrive in the region and contribute to New York's economy, if confronted with polluting chemicals in local aquifers and subsequently in the wine itself?
