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7/29/2019 Press Release Dallas Residents at Risk
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For immediate release: January 22, 2013
For more information:
Ed Meyer, Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance, 972-322-2609, [email protected]
Zac Trahan, Texas Campaign for the Environment, 214-599-7840, [email protected]
Another Dallas Gas Drilling Bait and Switch:
Mayor, City Staff Pressure Dallas Park Board to
Endorse Drilling on Park Land
City Manager previously claimed that only off-site drilling
would be allowed
(Dallas)---Mayor Rawlings and city staff have begun pressuring the Dallas Park and
Recreation Board to endorse plans to drill on city-owned park lands adjacent to the
newly remodeled Luna Vista Golf Course, just as they are pressing the City Plan
Commission to undo their past denial and ultimately approve these drilling permits as well.
But that's not what city staff told the Park Board back in 2008 when the City Manager was
pushing for Dallas to lease this public land to the gas company. A 2008 public presentation
by city staff to Mayor Leppert and the City Council included explicit promises thatno
surface drilling was to be allowed on city-owned parklands, even though the areas
proposed to be leased to the gas company Trinity East were almost exclusively park lands.Horizontal drilling was said to be the solution.
Based on representations made by city staff, both the City Council and the Park and
Recreation Board held votes in 2008 in which they endorsed the idea of allowing only off-
site, sub-surface drilling for park lands. But now Trinity East is seeking permits to drill
on the surface of two park land areas in northwest Dallas, not under them.
Just days after the City Council approved the lease in 2008, the Park Board passed a
resolution to allow only horizontal, off-site drilling under city park lands, said Ed
Meyer of the Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance. He uncovered the 2008
documents through open records requests. What they're proposing nowit's a
classic bait and switch, and the Park Board never approved it.
In the months leading up to the 2008 lease agreement, city staff claimed that the lease
would not give the gas company any rights to conduct surface-level drilling onpark
7/29/2019 Press Release Dallas Residents at Risk
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landsbut then in 2010 Trinity East applied for permits to do just that. Now city staff has
reversed course, claiming that refusing these applications could result in lawsuits from the
gas company.
That didn't sit well with at least one City Plan Commission member.
We are being asked to reconsider our vote because denial.... may lead to lawsuits bythe applicant, said Sally Wolfish, a member of the City Plan Commission who went
against city staff and voted against reconsidering the drilling applications during a January
10th hearing.
Needless to say, neighborhood and environmental groups aren't happy with what they see
as an open deception. Zac Trahan of the Texas Campaign for the Environment didn't
mince words.
Either the City Manager and her staff were lying about this in 2008, or they're lying
about it now. It's that simple.
And Trahan sees this as a dangerous slippery slope.
First their story was that drilling would only be allowed under park land, not on it. Now
their story is that drilling will only be allowed on passive, unused park land, never an active
city park. Is that the bait theyll switch again in the future?
The Trinity East lease includes some park land areas that are currently being used as active
city parks. Trahan worries that the city attorney might argue that unless Dallas allowsdrilling there, too, the company will threaten legal action again. The exact same logic
theyre using today could be used again to make that very assertion, he says.
These people should be ashamed of themselves, industry and city staff alike. Our
city park lands are for public enjoyment, not industrial operations.
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