<div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div>Dear folks,<br><br></div>Someone wrote a very inaccurate and misleading letter to the editor for the Willits Weekly. Shannon wrote an email to everyone asking someone to answer it and not let it stand. <br>
<br>I wrote one and it was rejected by the publication because they don't accept LTEs from outside the third district. <br><br></div>Please someone who lives in the third district answer this fallacious LTE.<br><br></div>
I enclose a copy of the LTE below.<br><br><br></div>Thanks<br></div>Ed Oberweiser<br><br>Community Rights and Wrongs<br>To the Editor:<br>In last week’s paper, Peter Norris wrote about the <br>Community Rights Network of Mendocino County <br>
(CRNMC) and its signature gathering campaign. CRNMC <br>has proposed a local ordinance to ban fracking and create <br>a “Community Bill of Rights,” bestowing legal rights on <br>“[a]ll residents, natural communities and ecosystems in <br>
Mendocino County ... to water, air and soil that is untainted <br>by toxins, carcinogens, particulates, nucleotides, and <br>hydrocarbons introduced into the environment through <br>unconventional extraction of hydrocarbons.”<br>
<br>I think we can agree that it is good to have clean water, <br>soil and air. I am a lifelong moderate environmentalist, <br>and I support reasonable environmental regulations.<br><br>But almost all human activity has some effect on the natural <br>
environment. I believe environmental concerns must be <br>balanced against other human needs – for homes, heat, <br>fuel, roads, jobs, computers and food, for instance.<br><br>I am wary of environmental campaigns that seek to elevate <br>
the “rights” of trees, plants and wildlife over the rights of <br>humans. We humans are part of nature, and we have a <br>right to live, too.<br><br>I am very wary of the proposed Community Rights ordinance for Mendocino County because it would allow any resident of the county to sue any government or private entity for perceived environmental impacts on any “natural <br>
community” – which includes any “wildlife, flora, fauna, soil <br>and air-dwelling and aquatic organisms…." The proposed<br>ordinance would also provide for recovery of expert and<br>attorneys fees and litigation costs by any resident who<br>
sues on behalf of a tree or a frog harmed by someone<br><br>The proposed <br>ordinance would also provide for recovery of expert and <br>attorneys fees and litigation costs by any resident who <br>sues on behalf of a tree or a frog harmed by someone.<br>
<br>I am afraid of fracking. I have read enough about it to know <br>it seems horribly dangerous to the environment, to wildlife <br>and to humans. I would sign a petition to enact an anti-<br>fracking ordinance in Mendocino County. But I am also <br>
afraid of overzealous environmental activists who might <br>use the proposed ordinance to disrupt local life and cost us <br>all a whole lot of money.<br><br>Before signing CRNMC’s petition, I urge everyone to read<br>the proposed ordinance on their website (<a href="http://www.crnmc.org">www.crnmc.org</a>)<br>
and try to imagine the worst possible effects if even one<br>unreasonable resident of Mendocino County wishes to<br>sue the county or private parties for some small perceived<br>harm to nature<br><br><br>Randi Covin, Brooktrails<br>
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