Hagan seeks hearings on fracking

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

State Rep. Robert F. Hagan of Youngstown, D-60th, penned an open letter to Ohio House Speaker William Batchelder asking for hearings about fracking.

Fracking, the process in which water, chemicals and sand are blasted into rocks thousands of feet below the ground to unlock natural gas and oil, has come under fire because of its potential environmental concerns.

Hagan, who earlier this week told The Vindicator he wanted a moratorium on all drilling, including injection wells, wants House leaders to consider “a cautious and thoughtful approach for the extraction of these natural resources.”

There are two bills — one in the House and one in the Senate — calling for a moratorium on drilling in the Utica and Marcellus shales in Ohio, but Hagan says there’s no chance the Democrat-authored pieces of legislation will gain any traction in the Republican-led chambers.

Drilling proponents point to shale’s job- creating potential; the industry could create as many as 200,000 jobs in Ohio, according to a recent Statehouse report, but economic analysts have said that figure is inflated.

Drilling detractors say fracking — a process that overall has been around for decades but with new technology has expanded to drill horizontally — can pollute air and water.