June 15: NOT Your Grandparents’ Oil & Gas Industry
Please plan to join OVEC at 6:30 p.m. on Monday, June 15 for NOT Your Grandparents’ Oil & Gas Industry: A Forum on Fracking — Is Unconventional Oil & Gas Drilling Coming to Wayne and Cabell Counties?

This free event takes place at the Westmoreland Women’s Club, 2962 Bradley Rd., Huntington, WV, 25704.

The forum is designed to inform members of the public who live in West Virginia counties that overlie the Rogersville Shale, including Cabell, Wayne, Lincoln, Putnam, Kanawha, Jackson, Roane and Calhoun counties. See a map here.

Presenters will include Joe Lovett, an attorney with the Appalachian Mountain Advocates and Bill Hughes, a volunteer with the Wetzel County Citizen Action Group and a part-time OVEC staff person.

Filmmaker Keely Kernan will screen a 10-minute trailer for In the Hills and Hollows, a documentary-in-progress. The film follows the lives of several residents impacted by fossil fuel extraction. Help get this film into production by supporting its KickStarter campaign.

If you have been approached by oil or gas industry representatives seeking to lease your mineral rights, or to gain right of way access to your property, then we strongly recommend that you attend this forum. Legal advisers will be present.

If you want to learn about challenges facing our area, then please attend this forum. Hear firsthand about disruptions to health, well-being and property that the Marcellus Shale “fracking boom” has brought to our neighbors in north-central West Virginia.

Click here to join the event on Facebook. Please invite your FB friends to join, too.

Please help spread the word about our forum: print then post this flier in friendly locales. 

Return to Index

Write Your Climate Letter Now, Get it Hand Delivered in DC
The news on human-caused climate disruption is increasingly alarming, yet West Virginia’s Congressional delegation seemingly could care less.

Starting June 20, the Citizens Climate Lobby heads to Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., to let our representatives and senators know that the folks back home are demanding action on climate disruption.

This year, six members of the WV CCL will be in D.C. to train, then lobby for the political will to curb CO2 emissions! You can help without travelling to D.C. WV CCL has a simple letter that you can fill-in. Download this, print, add your own words, sign and then get the letter to WV CCL before June 20.

Completed letters can be delivered several ways:
– Scan and e-mail them to charlestonwv@citizensclimatelobby.org;
– Snail mail them to:
Jim Probst
7419 Hamlin Rd
Hamlin, WV 25523
– Bring them to the next WV CCL at noon on June 6 at the WVSU EDC building, 1506 Kanawha Blvd W., Charleston, WV

Your completed letters will be hand-delivered to the offices of Senators Manchin and Capito and Representatives McKinley, Mooney, and Jenkins. Help the in-person lobby team demonstrate how many West Virginians want action now. Write a letter today!

Increase your impacts by asking family and friends to write letters, too.

Remember, WV CCL leaves on June 20, so write those letters now.

If you live in another state, you can still use this form to write your letter and get it to WV CCL before June 20 (see above). WV CCL will get your letter into the hands of lobbyists from your state, who will in turn get it into the offices of your Congressional delegation. 

Return to Index

ARC Wants to Hear From You
The Appalachian Regional Commission is holding a series of “listening sessions” in Appalachia as it develops a new strategic plan to guide the Commission’s economic and community development efforts over the next five years. These sessions will help ARC develop a deeper understanding of emerging opportunities, challenges, and issues in communities across the Region.

There is no cost to attend the listening sessions, but registration is required. Each session will be held from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Lunch will be provided. ARC hopes to hear from a broad range of community members, including citizens, local leaders, students, and representatives of private, public, and nonprofit organizations. Join one of these remaining sessions to share your ideas and vision for your community:

Morehead, KY: Thursday, June 4
Morehead Conference Center, 111 East 1st Street

Altoona, PA: Thursday, June 11
Blair County Convention Center, One Convention Center Drive

Morgantown, WV: Tuesday, June 16
Morgantown Event Center, Three Waterfront Place

See the agenda for the listening sessions here. Register here. For more information on the listening sessions, please contact ARC at 202.884.7748 or at conferences@arc.gov.

Return to Index

Help Plan The Ground Beneath Our Hearts
The Ground Beneath Our Hearts, a global spectacle to honor the creativity, dignity and resilience of people living in communities affected by mining and oil and gas development, is set for September 12.

This summer, The Ground Beneath Our Hearts invites communities around the world to collaborate in planning the global day of art and action. Partner communities will meet others who know the difficulties they face to share stories, support and ideas and show the world that the real treasure in a place is its people.

So far people in places like New South Wales, Australia; Johannesburg, South Africa; the Front Range of Colorado; Alberta, Canada; and Appalachia, United States of America, are planning events to celebrate the human spirit and love of place by creating a unique work of art. Each work will incorporate the circle, a symbol of wholeness.

As you may have guessed, OVEC is one of the groups collaborating with The Ground Beneath Our Hearts. On the planning team so far are Tonya Adkins, Jeannie Kirkhope, Wilma Steele, Paula Swearengin and Carol Warren. OVEC’s art action will focus on mountaintop removal. To join the planning team, reply to this e-mail.

Click here to watch a video describing the scope of the event, the people involved and the special places they love.

Return to Index