A victory 20 years in the making - Western Colorado Alliance for Community Action

This week, after 20 years of grassroots organizing with impacted landowners and everyday folks across Western Colorado, Western Colorado Alliance and our allies won precedent-setting rules to protect the public health, safety, and welfare of all Coloradans from the impacts of oil and gas development.

On Monday, in a historic decision, the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) gave preliminary approval for new rules that will:

Create a 2,000-foot setback that will move oil and gas facilities away from every single home, school and other high-occupancy building in the state.
Give legal standing to all adjacent homeowners and residents living within in 2,000 feet of an oil and gas facility to challenge drilling applications before the COGCC.
Implement new rules addressing environmental justice and impacts of oil and gas development on disproportionately impacted communities.
Require alternative location analysis for all applications near homes, disproportionately impacted communities, and important wildlife habitat.
Develop criteria for cumulative impacts analysis, meaning operators will have to provide data for anticipated public health effects, air emissions, and impacts to water, wildlife, and habitat for every proposed application.

These rules are not perfect, but taken together, they are a giant step forward in our decades-long effort to reform oil and gas development in Colorado. This victory is only possible because of members like you, who have spent countless hours in meetings, writing comments, giving testimony, and working on the ground to demand change.

But the work is not done yet. As mandated by law, all of the COGCC’s rules must be re-written under their new mandate to first protect public health and safety, and the environment, in oil and gas permitting. We are still working through hundreds of rules that need to be updated and we have weeks of hearings before the final vote is taken in November.

Our opposition isn’t letting up. Garfield County alone is spending $1.5-million to gut these rules and prevent them from going into effect in Western Colorado. We have to keep organizing to ensure these rules protect all Coloradans equally.

Thanks to you, we are winning real, tangible reform that will improve the lives of Western Coloradans. And we still need your help to get us across the finish line. Help us stay strong through this process and please consider making a donation today.

This victory shows us that grassroots organizing for the long haul works. It has taken us many years to get here, and there is more work ahead, but our Alliance is committed and will keep organizing for healthy, just, and self-reliant communities across Western Colorado.

About the author

Emily Hornback

Emily stepped up as our staff director in 2017, but originally joined our team as a community organizer in 2013. Born and raised on the Western Slope, Emily graduated from Colorado State University and then had the privilege of learning from and working alongside organizers in Central and South America as well as Appalachian coal country. They returned to their home state to protect the land they love and work with fellow Coloradans for a healthy, just and self-reliant future for our rural communities. Emily enjoys organizing, exploring the Colorado Plateau, country music and punk concerts with equal passion.