Florida and your grandchildren won a battle today, Tue. March 1, 2016. Sen. Garrett Richter’s bad pro-facking, pro-oil industry, pro-money over environment SB 318 was withdrawn as he faced defeat. This in spite Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection who brought hired guns from Tulsa, Oklahoma last week to assure Senators that fracking was safe.
The death of SB 318 marks also the demise of the companion House Bill, already passed on the Floor.
Many people all over the State of Florida and many outside the state worked very hard for many months to accomplish this, what seemed impossible at many points. People drove for hours to Tallahassee and then were denied a few moments to give their opinion, or had to sit and listen to Senators and other so-called authorities speak outright lies. They missed family events, spent their own gas money, missed work and the needed paycheck. All this for future generations of Floridians who may not even know the sacrifices done for them.
Many groups and many individuals deserve credit and the list is very long and the distances very great, we must mention only those who devised the Floridans Against Fracking, Kim Ross, Amy Datz, OSFR’s own Merrillee Malwitz-Jipson, Brian Lee and Jorge Aguilar. Many others may be equally deserving and we hate to stop here.
Don’t go away, we may need you again, but for now, celebrate and pop the cork and congratulate yourself at least for a bit. Caring people are ahead just a tad and life is good!
