Dearest Line 6B readers,
Wanna get involved? This week, you’ve got two opportunities. Check them out:
- At noon on Sunday (July 14th), “Oil and Water Don’t Mix: A Rally for the Great Lakes” will be held at Bridge Park in St. Ignace (just over the Mackinac Bridge). The rally is to call attention to the dangerous aging pipeline owned and operated by Enbridge that runs under the straits of Mackinac. Our friend (and official hero!) Beth Wallace has worked very hard to bring attention to this serious threat to the health of the Great Lakes. And 350.org founder Bill McKibben will the be the keynote speaker at the rally. If you’ve got time and want to take a drive up the the beautiful bridge, please try to attend. More details can be found here. (And when the rally’s over, we recommend you go get yourself a burger at Clyde’s!)
- Or if you’d rather just make a phone call or write a letter, our marvelous friends at the Pipeline Safety Trust are working this week (and testifying before a congressional committee) on pointing out some serious deficiencies in a piece of legislation known as the “Natural Gas Pipeline Permitting Reform Act.” This is an industry-friendly, landowner-unfriendly bill designed to “streamline” the approval process for interstate pipelines. As you can imagine, the Trust– and we agree vehemently– thinks this is a bad idea. If you’ve read anything here about the pitiful state of federal pipeline regulations or the Michigan state regulatory process, you already know that the last thing these processes need is “streamlining” (which is really just another term for deregulation!). In our view, they are already WAY too streamlined. To take just one little example that we’re sure you’ll find alarming, the bill would simplify the process for eminent domain authorization, making it that much easier for private companies to take indiviuals’ property, severely limiting landowners’ ability to protect their rights. Members of the committee currently considering the bill can be found here. Please write to your representative and urge them to work on behalf of landowners and ordinary citizens, not large corporations!
Go!