Middletown residents failed by their leaders
To the Times: Last night I sat in the crowd at the Middletown Council meeting and simply listened as one resident after another shared their experiences with the pipeline.
Many had tears in their eyes as they spoke of their love for Middletown, and how heartbroken they are to see devastation to wide swaths of land. They spoke of the guilt they feel for letting their kids play in Chester Creek, not knowing if drilling materials had been spilled in the area, and how Sunoco has violated noise ordinances.
Listening to one personal and emotional experience after the next, it dawned on me … nothing should trump public safety, public health and environmental protection. And yet, here we are in Middletown with all three in jeopardy.
So how did we get here? There is plenty of blame to go around: from the current governor and his predecessor; to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection; to the courts for deciding that this private pipeline is somehow a utility (thereby giving them the power of eminent domain.)
I’d like to focus on the role our local Middletown Township Council played in this travesty. In 2016, they negotiated with Sunoco to sell easements to townshipowned properties and voted unanimously to do so for 1.8 million dollars. They voted without doing basic research. For example, what will be the effect on the health and safety of Middletown residents? What will be the effect on our local environment? How will it impact property values? Are the liquids the pipeline will be carrying explosive? What is the route and will it be set back far enough from homes, areas where families congregate, and schools? A quantitative risk assessment could have answered some of those questions, but did our council order such an assessment before voting to approve the sale of the easements? No!
They also voted without properly informing the public. As one resident put it last night, and I’m paraphrasing, “I don’t use social media, but I read every newsletter sent to me from the township. I know when leaves are being collected and when Middletown-sponsored trips are planned. How did I not know about this pipeline?”
This person is not alone. At every meeting another resident talks about how they were illinformed about the pipeline. And yet, when the Middletown council was asked to be more transparent by making the meetings available on YouTube, Facebook Live, or public access cable channels, they refused to do so. Making matters worse, officially written minutes from meetings where pipeline issues are discussed are often delayed. For example, it took more than half a year for the township to publish the minutes from the September 2016 meeting where they voted to sell easements to Sunoco.
Our township leaders have proven to be inept at protecting our local environment, our public safety, and our public health. They continually fail at informing the public in a timely manner about issues that affect our lives and seem to be working more for the benefit of Sunoco than for the residents of Middletown.
Any councilman or councilwoman who voted to sell easements to Sunoco rather than fight for our community should resign. They either voted without knowing the risks to our area, or knew about the risks and chose to sell the health and safety of our community for a small one-time fee. I don’t know which is worse.
“So how did we get here? There is plenty of blame to go around.” — Christopher Garriga