ALBANY -- Is the fight over gas drilling an upstate/downstate issue?
Monday's demonstrators were appreciative of a package of water protection bills introduced by Senate Democrats. But enthusiasm wasn't enough for passage. So far, one of the four bills has died, and prospects for the other three don’t look good.
Opponents of high powered horizontal gas drilling cheered Democrats Monday after hearing about their 4 water protection bills…
Krueger along with New York City-based colleagues Joseph Addabo and Tony Avella sponsored the legislation which includes an outright ban on hydrofracking.
It's only been 2 days since the rally, but Krueger's bill, is already dead…
Senator Tony Avella, D-Queens, said "Even those people who want hyrdrofrlacking should want very very strict regulations and Liz Krueger was one of those."
It fell by a single vote in the Senate ENCON committee, the victim of the upstate/downstate divide.
Senator Avella continued, "But I don't think the issue itself should be upstate or downstate because we all need clean water.
Senator Mark Grisanti, D-Buffalo, Chairman, Senate ENCON Committee, said "You needed an eighth vote. And Senator Oppenheimer was ill. She was at the hospital."
Republicans Ken LaValle and Mark Grisanti, who chairs the ENCON committee, voted yes without rec which moves a bill out of committee but without the promise of future support.
Grisanti explains, "There was other parts of the bill that was going to be duplicative of what the DEC was already going to be doing."
Both Grisanti and Avella voiced concern about the DEC’s ability to regulate hyrdrofracking after years of budget decreases. Chairman Grisanti told the Capitol Report that he would support new legislation bolstering DEC’s regulation efforts if he was asked to do so by the scientific community.
