The Green Party of Pennsylvania has called for the resignation of John Hanger, acting secretary of the state Department of Environmental Protection, citing his statement that the value of the natural gas in the deep Marcellus shale formation outweighs the environmental damage the drilling may cause.Mr. Hanger, in a story on the Reuters wire last week, said the drilling into the 5,000- to 8,000-foot-deep shale formation that underlies much of the state will "inevitably" result in environmental damage, including possible contamination of water supplies.
Tim Reim, Erie County Green Party chairman, said in a Thursday release that Mr. Hanger's "willingness to sacrifice the rights of some Pennsylvanians to clean water from their own wells ... so the natural gas industry can profit privately" contradicts the DEP's mission.
It was a rough week for Mr. Hanger, who was criticized by conservative Republican lawmakers at a Pennsylvania Senate confirmation hearing in Harrisburg Wednesday.
Mr. Hanger, a former executive director of Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future, a more mainstream statewide environmental group, said it was a "typical week." He said he has no plans to resign and rejected Mr. Reim's and the Green Party's positions as inaccurate and extreme.
DEP Chief Should Resign...
John Hanger's well-deserved reputation as a vigorous defender of both enviromental (green) technologies as well as a host of consumer protections should find his personal integrity as being no less than unimpeachable in spite of the contemptible and (mostly failed) attacks by our legislative pigmies.
Incredibly, the Acting Secretary now must suffer criticism from no less than one Tim Reim, "Erie County Green Party chairman."
Forgive me, but who in hell is Mr. Reim and how many of Pennsylvania's citizens does he speak for?
Has everyone forgotten that the very same Green Party's candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2006 (while opposing Democrat Bob Casey) had accepted political contributions from Republican supporters of no less than Rick Santorum?
The most recent initiative of Acting Secretary Hanger was to champion (in 2008) the approval of a $400 million bond issue to help hundreds of our municipalities to address their critically-aging infrastructures ...an initiative that was sanctioned by the Commonwealth's voters in full support of Hanger's leadership role on this most serious issue.
It is perhaps worth noting that this very same Hanger initiative was nearly a full year ahead of President Obama's Stimulus legislation, which in itself, is now specifically targeting the rebuilding of America's crumbling infrastructure.
This should bring a great deal of credit to both Mr. Hanger as well as to Governor Rendell who fully supported this essential bond issue.
Matt Thomas