Group Mobilizing Big Anti-Fracking ‘Earthquake’

Activists led by 350.org are hoping to create their own "earthquake" in Ohio by organizing the biggest anti-fracking gathering ever to mobilize forces and stop the controversial practice.

April 10, 2012 | Source: Common Dreams | by

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Activists led by 350.org are hoping to create their own “earthquake” in Ohio by organizing the biggest anti-fracking gathering ever to mobilize forces and stop the controversial practice.

The action is being led by the 350.org Action Fund with grassroots leaders from Ohio’s anti-fracking movement, as well as Gasland director Josh Fox.

The activists plan on gathering in Columbus, Ohio, from June 14 to 17.

On the Don’t Frack Ohio! website, organizers write that the fracking industry has caused earthquakes in Ohio, and they urge people to mobilize forces to create an “earthquake” of their own. “Instead, we need to aim for an 8.0 on the political scale-we need to shake Columbus with the biggest anti-fracking gathering yet seen in the U.S.”

The group highlights the destruction fracking leaves in its wake including earthquakes, water and air pollution and economic ruin for communities.

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Don’t Frack Ohio! Invitation to action:

Dear friends-

The fracking industry has been causing earthquakes in Ohio. So it’s time we caused one of our own.

No, not a 4.0-on-the-Richter-scale temblor like the one that shook Youngstown on New Year’s Eve. Instead, we need to aim for an 8.0 on the political scale-we need to shake Columbus with the biggest anti-fracking gathering yet seen in the U.S.

Save these dates: June 14-17, in Columbus. The 14-16th will be dedicated to training and movement building, and on the 17th we’ll be taking over the Ohio statehouse for a people’s assembly that will ‘pass’ legislation that Ohioans need to stop this destructive practice. You can sign up here, but we need you to do more-please spread the word to friends and colleagues. And get ready for the caravan that will cross the state in mid-May to raise awareness – we’ll have much more on that front soon.

Other governors, from New York, to Colorado, to even California should be on notice that a powerful movement against fracking is brewing in their backyards.

Fracking is a great mistake for many local reasons. By now we’ve seen its effects on local water supplies: the dead creeks in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, the wells poisoned to the point where residents can’t drink from their faucets. We’ve watched fracking cause the worst air pollution in the U.S., even in Wyoming counties so remote and unpopulated that they lack stoplights. We’ve seen enough to know that communities are as easy to fracture as rocks-that neighbors have been turned against neighbors, and towns blighted as they turn into industrial zones crisscrossed by endless tanker trucks.