GCCC against Sabal Trail in Albany, GA

The Georgia Climate Change Coalition Bike Lines to stop Pipe Lines stopped in Albany yesterday and got some news coverage.

Diane Dean, WALB TV, 24 November 2014, Bike riders focus on GA environment,

Members of the Georgia Climate Change Coalition are concerned about what the planet will look like for future generations.

“It crosses the flint and Chattahoochee River and their water sheds that provide drinking water for hundreds of thousands of people,” said Gretchen Elsner of the Georgia Climate Change Coalition.

Rich Rusk is an avid fly fisher. His father and former Secretary of State Dean Rusk told him climate change would be the issue for his generation.

He is concerned for his children and grandchildren. “It’s gonna have tremendous impact on their lives we older people have a huge responsibility to stop kicking that can down the road and get serious about climate change,” said Rusk.

“We are seeing some of the biggest storms wipe away our cities and we’re watching japan dump billions of gallons of nuclear waste into the oceans,” Elsner said. “I’m terrified.”

Brad McEwen, Albany Herald, 24 November 2014, text and pictures, Cyclist group hosts anti-pipeline event in Albany | VIDEO: Georgia Climate Change Coalition cyclists stop at Albany’s Art Park,

Growing opposition to a proposed natural gas pipeline through Dougherty County now includes a group of cyclists from North Georgia who stopped in Albany Monday to host an awareness event in downtown’s Art Park.

The Albany Herald also included this video of Nancy Barclay of the Radium Springs Neighborhood Association, who said of the GCCC bikers,

They understand the importance of not allowing this entity to exist in our region.

And of Gretchen Elsner of GCCC, who said she learned about the proposed Sabal Trail pipeline and the Albany compressor station through the Ray Henry AP story, in which she discovered these were

infrastructure projects completely contrary to the best interests of the citizens of the state and of the planet as a whole.

She and GCCC decided to help educate the public early to avoid the kind of problems that are happening with another pipeline project in New England. She was apparently referring to Spectra’s Algonquin pipeline project, previously noticed by WALB TV 1 July 2014.

Elsner said the Sabal Trail situation offers an opportunity to have discussion before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has issued permits allowing the pipeline construction, rather than after the fact, as has happened in other states.

“We have to take this positive, constructive energy that we’re putting into some of our campaigns and lend a hand to the opposition that is building here in Albany,” said Elsner. “Without resorting to the same kind of measures that people in New England are taking against this very same company that’s executing a pipeline expansion across the entire eastern seaboard. People in New York and Rhode Island and Vermont, Pennsylvania, didn’t really get the jump on it when the permitting processes were happening and now they find these pipelines being run through their community. They’re chaining themselves to construction fences, they’re locking themselves to the office doors of their elected officials, they’re getting arrested. We just don’t need to do that here in Georgia.”

And it works both ways. The Herald also quoted Albany’s Gloria Gaines as saying the pipeline presents a concern for all of Georgia, including:

“We welcome that attention that this is bringing at the state level, we do need that. We need our state officials to step up to the plate on this.”

GCCC also got some preliminary coverage by Wayne Ford in OnlineAthens 11 November 2014, Pipeline protest bike ride planned for Athens to Albany on Nov. 22.

-jsq

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