We in Colorado Springs have recently experienced an interesting juxtaposition of legislative attitudes, although the two situations have a common attribute: government ineptitude.
The El Paso County Board of Commissioners is doing nothing while a serious and well-documented problem looms, and the Colorado Springs City Council is taking decisive, misdirected action against a problem that few people think really exists.
The serious problem is very real. A Texas energy company will soon start drilling for gas in the national forest in northern El Paso County, close to people’s homes.
These days, gas is brought to the surface by violent, intrusive means, with injections of water and other stuff to crack the underground rock formations and release the gas.
How that affects ground water is a crap shoot that the gas company is quite ready to gamble on – they don’t live here and they can drink bottled water while working.
At the surface, we will have roads, drilling rigs, drilling pads, the release of various chemicals, and a panoply of industrial noise, traffic and pollution.
Some counties in Colorado have already been hammered by this energy boom, out near the Roan Plateau, and several counties have enacted comprehensive regulations in an effort to minimize the adverse impact of energy development – not to outlaw the work, which a county cannot do, but just buffer it a little.
El Paso County? Well, one commissioner thought we should wait and see – no activist he, no, sir.
The fact that drilling for gas is known to be terribly disruptive of the environment and has degraded the quality of life elsewhere in Colorado does not mean it would do that here, right?
His head is in the sand so deeply that perhaps he will find gas. Another commissioner did not even know the Board had any jurisdiction, so well versed in her job description is she.
Will new regulations fix all the problems that gas drilling will bring? No.
Can we learn from other counties” experience, and will up-to-date regulations minimize those problems? Yes and yes.
Is the El Paso Board of County Commissioners effectively protecting our best interests? Not so much.
Then there is the feral cat problem. You know, of course, about the troubles Colorado Springs has with roving bands of vicious wild cats who scrawl graffiti, hang out on corners, and make it dangerous for school children to wait at bus stops.
You hadn’t noticed a problem? Well, our City Council has, and they are right on the ball, passing a law that requires licensing of cats to raise funds so the Humane Society can deal with that pressing danger.
Of course, most cats promptly remove their collars, so we won’t know which cats are licensed and which are not, but the Council fixes that problem by promising not to round up cats.
Wait a minute, how else do you deal with feral cats? Never mind. There’s nothing quite so impressive as passing a law and then assuring us it won’t be enforced.
And the licensing fees will pay for only half the cost of dealing with the feral cat problem, whatever that is.
Responsible pet owners are therefore charged for being responsible, and more cats will die because ours is not a no-kill animal shelter.
There is a net benefit for the song birds who suffer from domestic cat predation, but – wasn’t this law intended to deal with feral cats, rather than save birds?
One city councilman says fair is fair, because we license dogs, although his comment is as relevant to cat licensing as it is to a discussion of the Designated Hitter Rule.
I wonder how soon we will have a problem with rats and mice, and I look forward to seeing what the City Council does about it.
So we are ignoring a serious, known threat while passing ineffective laws about a problem that is not much of a problem.
I plan to talk sternly to our cat, explaining that he’d better get himself a license.
Then I will walk our (licensed) dogs in one of our lovely leash-free dog parks that are supported by license fees, and I will count my blessings that the dog park is miles away from the gas wells.
F.R. Pamp is a Colorado Springs lawyer, adjunct professor of environmental law and a consultant to non-profit organizations. He was a Colorado Voices panelist for The Denver Post in 2006.
