Recently, folks living in south county have seen a proliferation of the pro-fracking No on J signs springing up like fungi. They are everywhere: on county lands, on federal BLM lands, and worse, on people’s property when no permission to plant them there was ever given. All of that is illegal. It’s called “electioneering” under the state election laws. When they do it to people’s private land, it’s called vandalism.
In Panoche Valley, six Yes on J signs were stolen in the middle of the night, and in four of those cases, No on J signs appeared in the exact spots where the Yes signs were.
Two signs placed on the Williams family spread were ripped-off, another at the Chargin family ranch on New Idria Road also vanished. At the other end of the county, organic farmer Mark Gibson – a known endorser of Yes on J – discovered that two No on J billboards suddenly sprouted on his place. And the list of vandalizing, theft, and littering goes on and on.
This all might sound very petty to the average county citizen, but then, you have to think about it: It is clear that some opponents to Measure J have no respect for either property rights or people’s First Amendment rights. By putting these signs up, they are trying to force someone to publicly endorse a position that is not in reality reflective of the victim’s political views.
The Yes on J people put up signs only with the approval of property owners, while the pro-frackers apparently put up signs wherever they can get away with it. That does not portend well for any hope that they or their Big Oil heroes will follow any regulations. And when they do it in their oil drilling operations, they will do permanent harm.
Fracking and other extreme oil extractions, like matrix acidization and cyclic steam injection, use up and contaminate up to six millions of gallons of ground water per well, per “frack” – water we can ill afford to squander in the worst drought California has seen in 800 years (according to meterologists).
The effort to stop the fracking ban is championed by a group called San Benito United for Energy Independence, and on Monday they filed their quarterly report with the local Elections Office. To date, they have poured an unprecedented $1.74 million into stopping the San Benito fracking ban, with almost all of the money coming from Big Oil’s state political action committee, called Californians for Energy Independence. Their 460 report can be viewed at https://care.cosb.us/eRetrieval/Search/FilerForms.aspx?y=2
The Coalition to Protect San Benito, a group of local residents who placed Measure J on the ballot, has raised $93,829 for their campaign to save the county’s water.
Don’t let Big Oil or their cheerleaders bully you. Vote YES on J, and help save San Benito’s water.