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For immediate release: January 22, 2013

For more information:

Ed Meyer, Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance, 972-322-2609, meyer6016@sbcglobal.net

Zac Trahan, Texas Campaign for the Environment, 214-599-7840, zac@texasenvironment.org

Another Dallas Gas Drilling Bait and Switch:

Mayor, City Staff Pressure Dallas Park Board to

Endorse Drilling on Park Land

City Manager previously claimed that only off-site drilling

would be allowed

(Dallas)---Mayor Rawlings and city staff have begun pressuring the Dallas Park and

Recreation Board to endorse plans to drill on city-owned park lands adjacent to the

newly remodeled Luna Vista Golf Course, just as they are pressing the City Plan

Commission to undo their past denial and ultimately approve these drilling permits as well.

But that's not what city staff told the Park Board back in 2008 when the City Manager was

pushing for Dallas to lease this public land to the gas company. A 2008 public presentation

by city staff to Mayor Leppert and the City Council included explicit promises thatno

surface drilling was to be allowed on city-owned parklands, even though the areas

proposed to be leased to the gas company Trinity East were almost exclusively park lands.Horizontal drilling was said to be the solution.

Based on representations made by city staff, both the City Council and the Park and

Recreation Board held votes in 2008 in which they endorsed the idea of allowing only off-

site, sub-surface drilling for park lands. But now Trinity East is seeking permits to drill

on the surface of two park land areas in northwest Dallas, not under them.

Just days after the City Council approved the lease in 2008, the Park Board passed a

resolution to allow only horizontal, off-site drilling under city park lands, said Ed

Meyer of the Mountain Creek Neighborhood Alliance. He uncovered the 2008

documents through open records requests. What they're proposing nowit's a

classic bait and switch, and the Park Board never approved it.

In the months leading up to the 2008 lease agreement, city staff claimed that the lease

would not give the gas company any rights to conduct surface-level drilling onpark

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landsbut then in 2010 Trinity East applied for permits to do just that. Now city staff has

reversed course, claiming that refusing these applications could result in lawsuits from the

gas company.

That didn't sit well with at least one City Plan Commission member.

We are being asked to reconsider our vote because denial.... may lead to lawsuits bythe applicant, said Sally Wolfish, a member of the City Plan Commission who went

against city staff and voted against reconsidering the drilling applications during a January

10th hearing.

Needless to say, neighborhood and environmental groups aren't happy with what they see

as an open deception. Zac Trahan of the Texas Campaign for the Environment didn't

mince words.

Either the City Manager and her staff were lying about this in 2008, or they're lying

about it now. It's that simple.

And Trahan sees this as a dangerous slippery slope.

First their story was that drilling would only be allowed under park land, not on it. Now

their story is that drilling will only be allowed on passive, unused park land, never an active

city park. Is that the bait theyll switch again in the future?

The Trinity East lease includes some park land areas that are currently being used as active

city parks. Trahan worries that the city attorney might argue that unless Dallas allowsdrilling there, too, the company will threaten legal action again. The exact same logic

theyre using today could be used again to make that very assertion, he says.

These people should be ashamed of themselves, industry and city staff alike. Our

city park lands are for public enjoyment, not industrial operations.

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