In front of the BLM
Before beginning the carpool caravan to the well pad, the group assembled in front of the new BLM building to sing “Blowin’ in the Wind.”
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Signs on the highway
Showing signs to passerbys on Hwy 191 in front of the Pinedale BLM office building.
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At the well pad
Elaine Crumpley, event organizer, addresses the group at the Questar well pad. David Smith provided the sound system for the event.
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Sunday Sit-In on the Anticline
Peaceful Protest
by Sue Sommers
May 5, 2008
About 60 men, women and children assembled at the Pinedale Bureau of Land Management (BLM) office building at noon Sunday to take part in a peaceful demonstration expressing dissatisfaction with the environmental impacts brought by gas development in Sublette County. This action was primarily inspired by the numerous ozone alerts this winter and the pervasive feeling of distrust those events engendered, but people seemed equally worried about wildlife, soil and water quality and the future health of the area’s children. Participants brought or made posters in the parking lot. Some displayed their placards alongside the highway to passing traffic, eliciting a few honks.
Then everyone quickly carpooled and formed a caravan for the trip to the Anticline. By about 1:30 everyone had arrived at the Questar site, which had been previously approved by the company and the BLM. The site was an enormous scraped-off area surrounded by high mounds of soil. The location dwarfed the group, which would have filled most of a meeting room in Pinedale. Two large pits occupied the north edge of the site, but there was no major equipment or active work occurring. People pulled out folding chairs and blankets and collected around a small trailer that had been equipped as a speaker’s platform. An acrid smell irritated eyes, noses and throats throughout the two-hour sit-in.
Security was provided by two BLM rangers and a Sublette County Sheriff’s deputy. Questar donated two porta-potties for the gathering.
Event organizer Elaine Crumpley cheerfully greeted the crowd by saying, “Welcome to my pad!” Then, a number of informed locals spoke, including Horton Spitzer, Rollie Sparrowe, Bob McCarty, Mary Lynn Worl, Sally Mackey, Linda Baker and Tracy McCarty.
Several people presented original music inspired by gas development issues. Jared Rogerson performed “Boomtown,” which summed up about all the impacts a resident might be experiencing right now in Pinedale. Vee sang a ballad about a dwindling and ill-fated antelope herd that finds itself amid subdivisions and gas wells at the end of its migration. A troupe of Pinedale High School girls sang “Please Leave Our Range,” a song addressed to the BLM and the gas companies. It asked, in the plaintive and innocent voice of youth, why these entities don’t seem to care about what is happening to the land and community, and why they lie so much. The pointed lyrics moved many to tears. In a refreshing break from the expected, Morgan Holz performed a skilled reading of Dr. Seuss’ famous environmental bedtime story, “The Lorax.” The concluding message of the tale, urging children to take better care of the land than their forebears have, was a sobering one given the number of youngsters, from toddlers to teens, in the audience.
It wasn’t exactly “Rigstock,” and it might not change the world, but it seemed to do these folks a world of good to show up, be counted, and share their efforts and ideas.
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