How Denton beat the frackers

AFTER FIVE years of a rigged task force; horrific planning and zoning meetings; city council discussions; countless hours flyering, rallying and tabling; untold industry threats; and thousands of hours of sleep lost, Denton residents won a ban on hydraulic fracturing within the city limits.

This fight started in late 2009, when a drilling site was set up across the street from a playground and hospital. The Texas Railroad Commission (which regulates and issues permits for oil and gas drilling--and no, we don't understand why either) had rules that specified there were to be 200-foot "setbacks" between a well and a home, business or school, while the city of Denton required only a 100-foot setback. According to the Texas Star-Telegram:

It seemed adequate, since many of the wells, as one council member put it, were "on the edge of nowhere." Then Denton expanded to encompass those areas as drilling technology changed forever with the advent of horizontal drilling--wildcatters could veer their vertical wells off on an arc, tapping into reserves miles away. Drilling pads also could support multiple wells, and old wells could be reworked.

Denton's drilling ordinances evolved to provide additional protections for the public's health and safety...But in those intervening years, the city allowed housing developers to build within 250 feet of established wells while the typical setback ordinance in other cities was larger. In Fort Worth, for example, there is a 600-foot setback between a well and other structures.

According to Frack Free Denton, while the city is home to some 270 gas wells, taxes related to natural gas development account for only 1 percent of the city's property tax revenues, and gas well royalties account for less than 1 percent of the city's budget.

Activists responded to the explosion of fracking inside the city by increasing attendance at City Council meetings and eventually forcing the city to agree to a two-stage plan: first, set up a series of committees to hammer out a stronger ordinance on fracking, and second, have public hearings of the City Council to set those regulations in place.

In reality, the city set up a task force packed with industry officials and just one voice against fracking.

Anti-fracking student activists with Rising Tide North Texas and community members in the Denton Stakeholders Drilling Advisory Group, later known as the Drilling Advisory Group (DAG), organized to attend almost every task force meeting and spoke about how they wanted nothing to do with the frackers.

For about a year, the city managed to stall the task force, until a weak ordinance was finally submitted to the planning and zoning commission. By the time the proposed ordinance hit the City Council in 2011, Occupy Denton, then at its peak, helped galvanize grassroots activists, who organized and won a moratorium on fracking permits in the city, while a revised ordinance was put together.

The meetings where public comments were allowed were always attended by at least 20 anti-fracking activists, and DAG and Denton Off Fossil Fuels (DOFF) maintained a presence, while trying to figure out how to propose our own ordinance. In fact, DOFF debated whether to propose a full ban or a "de facto" ban--by proposing setbacks of 1,200 feet.

Eventually, people agreed with a "de facto" ban, though a full ban was still on the minds of some. Activists began working to craft a stronger ordinance with setbacks of at least 1,200 feet, air and water quality testing, and requirements for drillers to purchase more insurance in the event of accidents.

When presented to the City Council as an alternative, these proposals were further compromised over months, until they were whittled down as far as possible--even as activists and community members were told that the resulting ordinance was better than we should have expected. By December 2012, people were tired but still hoping the ordinance would be adopted as initially proposed and applied to all wells, despite the city's continued argument that established wells had "vested rights" and should be exempt from new regulations.

The city passed the watered-down version of the ordinance in 2013, despite civil disobedience and protests. As Frack Free Denton noted, "The revised ordinance did not include several protections that neighboring cities have used, such as prohibiting open pits, compressor stations, venting and flaring, and requiring the use of vapor recovery units and air and water monitoring"

THE NEXT few months were confusing ones for activists. When the revised ordinance was violated by EagleRidge Energy within a month or so of being put into place, people expected the city to at least shut the violators down. But the city essentially caved. When a state district court judge denied its request for a temporary injunction, the city eventually reached an agreement with EagleRidge and dropped its lawsuit.

Activists who had initially thought a ban was impossible, and that pressing for one would only cause rifts with the rest of the community, decided to push for the "radical" demand of banning fracking in the city.

After meeting with a lawyer and putting a petition together, Frack Free Denton was launched. By late February 2014, the official petition drive for a citizens' initiative was begun. Over 180 days, people canvassed, tabled and rallied for the ban. The first meeting alone gave the petition one-third of the signatures needed to put it on the November ballot. By the time the petition was turned in, some 2,000 registered voters had signed on--a number close to the voter turnout in most City Council elections.

The Denton City Council had an opportunity to pass the initiative before it was set to go to the voters, but the City Council was so bought off by the oil and gas industry--one Council member's wife owns a share in a gas company, for example--that even after several public meetings with overwhelming support for the ban, it still refused.

This set off further grassroots activism. Parades were held, lawn signs were made and activists from North Texas Students Against Fracking and other groups began canvassing, flyering and tabling in support of the ban.

These activists were up against a campaign by the oil and gas industry that raised more than $230,000 through the group "Denton Taxpayers for a Strong Economy" for pro-fracking billboards, commercials, mailers and YouTube ads targeted at Denton and beyond. Devon Energy, XTO and Enervest Operating contributed $75,000 each to the group. Only eight other donors were listed for the group.

Denton Taxpayers for a Strong Economy engaged in outrageous attacks on anti-fracking activists. At one point, according to the Star-Telegram, the website of the group suggested that there are "Denton drilling ban supporters with Russian ties." The website also referred to letters from two Texas Railroad Commission members "raising questions about Moscow secretly working with environmental groups to ban hydraulic fracturing in Europe to boost their need for Russian energy."

DESPITE THESE smears, the pro-ban side won a large lead during early voting. On November 4, anti-fracking activists stood outside polling places with literature to help people understand the issue. Even in the pouring rain, activists held umbrellas to walk people into the polling places to make sure their votes counted. When the results were in, the ban won with 58 percent of the vote--despite the fact that Denton voters tend to vote 70 percent in favor of conservative causes.

But the oil and gas industry has decided it won't take "no" for an answer. Immediately after the victory at the polls, the Texas Oil and Gas Association and Jerry Patterson, the Texas Land Commissioner, filed separate legal challenges to the ban.

Denton Mayor Chris Watts declared that the city would defend the ban court as it would any other law. Meanwhile, Christie Craddock, the new chair of the Texas Railroad Commission, said her office would still issue permits for fracking in Denton.

"It's my job to give permits, not Denton's...We're going to continue permitting up there because it's my job," the Dallas Morning News reported Craddick as saying.

Anti-fracking activists expected that the fight wouldn't be over, even if the ban passed. We see this ongoing campaign as one step in the fight for our lives and our planet.

The ripple effects are already being felt by people in other communities, who are considering their fight against the frackers. Media coverage of the ban has gone global. When Chris Faulkner, the CEO of Breitling Energy Corp., visited London recently, he was questioned why he was trying to sell the UK on fracking when Texans had already said "no."

This is a fight that will continue, and hopefully other cities will join us in solidarity as the next steps are taken. It won't be enough until we have a new system that values people over profit.