News Details - UPDATE: Natural Gas Drilling: TCCOG Invites the Public to Learn and Comment (Location Confirmed)

The Tompkins County Council of Governments (TCCOG), of which Tompkins County is a member, will be staging two meetings in November critical to the discussion of natural gas issues in our area. The Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) released a draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (dSGEIS) on September 30 with a deadline for public comment of November 30. To facilitate understanding of and comment on the dSGEIS by our community, TCCOG is holding the following meetings for the general public (free of charge):

Public Information Session, November 5, 2009, 7:00 p.m.at the Unitarian Church, 306 N. Aurora St. at Buffalo St. in Ithaca. Presentations on the dSGEIS will help citizens understand the proposed regulations governing gas drilling and how to make their opinions heard.

Public Hearing on the dSGEIS, Thursday, November 19, 2009, 7:00 p.m., State Theatre,
107 W. State St., Ithaca. The public is invited to make verbal statements and/or submit written statements that TCCOG will submit to the DEC as formal comments on the dSGEIS. For information on other methods of submitting comments to the DEC before November 30, 2009, visit http://www.dec.ny.gov/energy/58440.html.

The DEC document, more than 800 pages long, is the State's plan to regulate drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus shale that underlies Tompkins County and surrounding regions. It is available online at http://www.dec.ny.gov/energy/47554.html and hard copies have been made available for public use at the Town of Ithaca offices, the Caroline Library, Brookton's Market in Brooktondale, Tompkins County Public Library, and the City Clerk's office in Ithaca City Hall.

Speakers for the November 5 meeting will be:

- David Kay, of the Community and Rural Development Institute (CARDI) at Cornell, will describe the environmental review process (SEQRA) that required the DEC to issue the dSGEIS. He will also provide an overview of the 809 page document—what’s in it and where to find it.

- Ed Marx, Tompkins County Commissioner of Planning and Public Works, will focus specifically on the section that describes mitigation measures that are proposed and how local governments may be affected.

- Helen Slottje, a local public interest attorney with an expertise in environmental law, will address deficiencies in the document and the legal implications for citizens and local governments.

A short Q&A session will follow these presentations. The public is urged to attend this session to learn about the document, its strengths and weaknesses, as well as the November 19 public hearing to submit comments to the DEC.

* Check http://www.tompkins-co.org/legislature/TCCOG/ for more information on TCCOG and drilling.

10-30-2009