By Dave Lucas
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wamc/local-wamc-891077.mp3
Albany, NY – New York's largest state park may face a threat from companies seeking to employ hydrofracking to extract natural gas from the earth. Capital District Bureau Chief Dave Lucas reports.
Allegany State Park in Cattaraugus County attracts some 2 million visitors a year. Some regard it as New York's most treasured park: it wasn't always that way... in the early 20th century the grounds were pockmarked with abandoned oil wells. It took nature nearly 100 years to reforest the landscape. Taxpayer dollars continue to pay for site clean-up in the form of capping old well holes.
Of the many companies that once mined Allegany, some of their "drilling rights" papers, over time, were rumoured to have found their way into the hands of US Energy Development Corporation, headquartered in Buffalo. Those drilling rights allow those who posess them the right to enter the park, cut down trees, build roads, and commence mining. About 100 miles due south in Pennsylvania's Allegheny National Forest, gas is being extracted from beneath a federal national forest in Pennsylvania. Fears are being raised that the hyrdofracking could spread northward. In 2008 US ENERGY informed the state Office of Parks, recreation and Historic Preservation it was planning to drill five test wells in the park's southeastern corner.
The drilling never began: the state decided that the paperwork dating back as far as 1881 was "legally incomplete" - the state DOES have "surface ownership" but determination as to who owns what's underneath remains in legal limbo. US Energy currently oversees three hydrofracking projects with more than 200 wells in nearby Pennsylvania. Advocates are asking the Office of Parks and Recreation to issue a master plan designating all of Allegany State Park as a park preserve, giving it the highest level of legal protection against activities like oil drilling and gas hydrofracking.