No Barging of Frack Waste on Our Rivers
March Madness is on! We are not talking basketball or primaries, but lots for you to do in terms of defending our water, democracy and our future.

First, an e-action you can take, no matter where you live: Demand that the U.S. Coast Guard ban the barging of fracking waste on our rivers.

Background
As you may remember, OVEC was instrumental in bringing together citizen groups working to safeguard the Ohio River from further degradation.

The groups have formed the Ohio River Citizens’ Alliance —give ORCA a like on Facebook here.

One concern of ORCA is the shipping of radioactive hydraulic fracturing waste in barges on the Ohio. Fracking wastes contain toxic chemicals like benzene and are laced with radioactive materials like water soluble radium-226, which is linked to leukemia and bone cancers.

We helped generate more than 70,000 comments to the U.S. Coast Guard opposing the transport of fracking wastes by barge. There were only 21 comments in support.
On February 22, we learned that the Coast Guard has determined that no new rules are needed to barge shipments of toxic, radioactive hydraulic fracturing waste. The Coast Guard has decided to use 40-year-old regulations, which fail to address unconventional oil field waste from fracking. The Coast Guard will allow shipment of fracking waste fluids to be determined on a case-by-case basis. Learn more here.

Please click here to contact the Coast Guard today to demand that the agency immediately ban fracking waste shipments on our nation’s waterways.

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March 8: Real Solutions Rendezvous for Our Water 

Our allies with Advocates for a Safe Water System invite you to:
March 8: REAL SOLUTION Rendezvous
7:00 – 8:30 p.m.
Starlings, 1599 Washington St. E., Charleston, WV

West Virginia American Water is not accountable to our communities. Even after hearing from hundreds of customers about high bills, broken mains, and foul water, the company and its captured regulators at the PSC paid little attention. The PSC did what they usually do, giving the water company about a third of what they asked for, only this time it was half: a 15.1% rate increase.

With West Virginia American Water’s last seven rate hikes paving the way, today we are now #4 in the highest water rates among large systems in the county. #4! Meanwhile, West Virginia American Water continues to let our infrastructure fall apart and refuses to be accountable to our community.

Now that the rate case is over, it’s time to turn our public officials’ attention to the real solution to our water woes: a locally owned, public water system. We need a water system that’s accountable to ratepayers. Join us for an evening meet up and help get 50 LETTERS FOR A PUBLIC WATER SYSTEM out to our public officials. We’ll have drinks, snacks and music, too.

Find more details here, and do come out tomorrow, March 8. Bring a friend!

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March 12: Rally at the State Capitol #RememberInNovember March now to #RememberinNovember. Join and share the event on Facebook by clicking here. Sign up for updates here.

In order to build bridges across our issues and inspire the raucous people power that we know leads to bold change, folks from a diverse spectrum of citizen groups in West Virginia have joined forces to organize the #RememberinNovember Rally.

Join us at 4 p.m. on Saturday, March 12 at the WV State Capitol, on the last day of the 2016 Legislative Session.

Hundreds of West Virginians are storming the capitol steps to show our unity and outrage. This year, the legislators have proposed and passed laws that suppress voters’ rights, undercut workers, endanger women’s access to health care, discriminate against our neighbors, threaten low-income families, and jeopardize clean water, and… the list goes on and on…

If you’ve found this legislative session to be especially ugly and disheartening, come share your frustration with hundreds of others who feel the same way. Even better, come join with hundreds of folks who want March 12 to be a kick off moment.

We know this rally won’t change this session—it’s almost over. But we will send out a message across the state that it’s time to come together, build power, and take back the capitol. Going forward, we have a chance to channel the outrage into unprecedented get-out-the-vote efforts in a way that builds alliances between groups. We can take back the capitol, if we work together.

It doesn’t matter if we don’t agree on every single issue—the common ground that we share as West Virginians who want to see our beautiful state thrive is so much more important than the differences of opinion that could hold us back if we let them.

Every one of us has an invaluable role to play in shaping the future of our state. We are West Virginians who value hospitality, fairness, and the right of all of us to access dignified work, health care, education and safe drinking water. We seek an economically just and democratic West Virginia. Join us March 12!

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Other Upcoming Events
There’s much more going on in March. Below are some of the events we want to make certain you know about. Please see our online calendar for many more, in locations near and far. Note the Earth Day events in April. If you’d like to volunteer to help with tabling at these events, contact info@ohvec.org.

March 8: End of the Line screening at MU Women’s Center. OVEC is a co-sponsor. The screening is in room BE5 of the Marshall University Memorial Student Center at 7:30 p.m.

March 10: West Virginia Environmental Council‘s Annual Awards Dinner at the Woman’s Club of Charleston from 6:00 – 10:00 p.m.

March 15: DEP Public Meeting on Fayette Co. Compressor Station Permit – Be Sure to Comment

Starting March 16, meetings in several locations on Source Water Protection Plans: Have Your Say.

These include a meeting to comment on the draft Source Water Protection Plan for the Huntington Water System, happening at both 1:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. on Thursday, March 17,  at the Marshall University Brad D. Smith Foundation Hall, 519 John Marshall Drive, Huntington, WV 25703. Click the link to review the Huntington Source Water Protection Plan Draft. If you want to join up with OVEC who will be at the Huntington meeting, email info@ohvec.org.

March 21: Deadline to comment to the U.S. Forest Service on whether to allow surveys through the Monongahela National Forest in Pocahontas and Randolph Counties in West Virginia and the George Washington National Forest for the proposed Atlantic Coast Pipeline.  Read some of the details in this news story. Check the Forest Service’s page on the ACP here. See the Forest’s Service page about commenting here. See the Dominion Pipeline Monitoring Coalition’s ACP interactive maps by following the link here.

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