Wednesday 16 July 2014
After Two Towns Beat the Fracking Industry in a Top State Court, Can Others Follow?
‘Until recently, few people outside of New York had heard of Dryden and Middlefield. But these two towns are now on the lips of environmental activists everywhere as they’ve become part of the battle cry against hydrofracking.
New York’s highest court issued a 5-2 decision upholding the legal theory called “municipal home rule” that has supported scores of municipal bans on oil and gas production in the state. Dryden and Middlefield’s cases were the first to reach the state’s Court of Appeals. The two upstate communities were being sued by large energy corporations that insisted they had a right to frack within their jurisdictions although both towns had zoning laws in place that prohibited some of the practices involved in hydrofracking.’
