Uninvited guests by Dave Mabell, June 24, 2014, Lethbridge Herald
Tony Hall, along with a group of protesters, express their concerns to officials including Greg Weadick, Lethbridge-West MLA and Minister of Municipal Affairs, after walking in before the start of an invitation-only Alberta Energy session Tuesday morning at the Coast Hotel and Conference Centre. Herald photo by Ian Martens
They weren’t the government’s invited guests. But concerned Lethbridge citizens made certain their views on urban drilling were heard. About a dozen members of local environmental groups walked into a hotel ballroom Tuesday morning, ahead of a by-invitation-only Alberta Energy session with representatives of the city, the county and other local authorities.
Wearing signs like “Excluded,” they stayed for a pointed discussion with Lethbridge cabinet minister Greg Weadick and others heading up the half-day meeting. Having been given the opportunity to speak at previous Lethbridge meetings on urban drilling, members said they’d hoped to be heard as the Conservative government begins to write a new policy on the issue.
That policy was promised two years ago, environmentalists point out, but oil companies have remained free to apply to drill inside city boundaries while the government stalls. Meanwhile a Calgary company, Goldenkey Oil, announced plans to drill three wells in west Lethbridge. It later withdrew after massive civic protest.
But not before the Lethbridge Chamber of Commerce, the city’s school boards and others joined voice with Lethbridge city council in demanding an end to urban drilling across Alberta until an official policy is created. Mayor Chris Spearman, one of those on Tuesday’s invitation list, said later the Lethbridge meeting did little to build the public’s confidence in Alberta’s government-appointed oil and gas “regulator.”
“Open public engagement didn’t take place,” and the public was not allowed to hear the presentations. But the mayor said the local environmental group spoke for many Lethbridge citizens. “We have heard loud and clear what their views are,” he pointed out.
Much of the morning, according to an official agenda, was spent on presentations from Alberta Energy, the Alberta Energy Regulator, Alberta Municipal Affairs, the Alberta Surface Rights Board, the Property Rights Advocate and Alberta Health Services.
In his presentation, the mayor said, Lethbridge council called for revisions to the province’s Municipal Government Act, to give cities and towns the final say on whether oil or gas wells may be drilled inside an urban area.
“We need a legislated right to regulate what happens within our municipal boundaries,” Spearman said. Mayors and councils across southern Alberta agree with Lethbridge on that, he said — and so do council members in other parts of the province.
As elected representatives, he said, city and town council members have to answer to their electorate, whatever their decisions.
“But the Alberta Energy Regulator is accountable to no one,” Spearman said. “And there is no method of appeal.”
By rejecting Lethbridge groups’ request for participation, he added, Alberta Energy officials reinforced ordinary Albertan’s distrust in the energy department’s appointed regulators. “The public does not have confidence in the Alberta Energy Regulator” because of its close ties to the industry, he warned.
“They see it as the Alberta Energy Facilitator.” [Emphasis added]
[Refer also to:
June 25, 2013: Tories crafting policy for urban oil well drilling
February 27, 2012: Thirty Year Old Study States Contaminated Well Water Is Irreversible
Slide from Ernst presentation in Lethbridge in 2011
The City of Courtenay is on the Comox Valley Water Supply System, passed a resolution in March 2006 declaring water as a public good:
“THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Council of the City of Courtenay recognizes and affirms that
• Water supports and connects all life and access to clean water is essential to the health and sustainability of al life on this planet
• The value of earth’s fresh water to the common good takes priority over any possible commercial value
• Fresh water is a legacy, a public trust, and a collective responsibility