History of Communication
This page is a log of the formal requests of the Larimer Alliance to the BOCC and their responses:
Comments by Colorado Rising and LOGIC on new regulations passed by the Commissioners
April 12, 2020
The Larimer County Commissioners passed into law their new regulations for the oil and gas industry on April 6, 2020, over strenuous protest by the Alliance to postpone the meeting due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The Alliance considers this an undemocratic and ill advised action, and had requested the Commissioners delay until the state rulemaking regarding SB-181 is completed in June 2020.
In addition, two other allied groups, LOGIC and Colorado Rising were in agreement with us. Both groups have attorneys on staff who are aware of the legal issues involved, and agreed to review the proposed regulations prior to that fateful meeting. They both sent letters to the Commissioners, which specified in detail why the proposed regulations were inadequate, and why they should not pass them at the time. Those letters are now published here for the public to read:
Letter to the Commissioners from LOGIC, League of Oil and Gas Impacted Coloradoans, March 5, 2020
Letter to the Commissioners from Colorado Rising, April 3, 2020
Larimer County Commissioners Publish Its First Oil & Gas Regulations under SB-181:
March 2020
With the publication of its final draft of its proposed regulations of oil & gas operations in the county under SB-181, the Alliance has reviewed them and found them severely wanting. As well, the Alliance has joined forces with two of the other most prominent organizations fighting against fracking in the state, namely Colorado Rising and LOGIC, the League of Oil & Gas Impacted Coloradoans. Below are their comments on the new regulations that were created by the Larimer County Oil & Gas Task Force, at the direction of the County Commissioners.
Read responses here about what these organizations said about these proposed regulations:
March 7, 2020: the Larimer Alliance published its critique of the BOCC's proposed Oil & Gas Regulations for Larimer County, which the Alliance considers seriously deficient; to see why, read here: Comments by Larimer Alliance on proposed oil & gas regulations, published on March 7, 2020
Nov 21, 2019: LOGIC and Larimer Alliance sent a joint letter to the BOCC, 18 pages long, which specified in detail our disagreements with the proposed regulations: see
Joint Larimer Alliance-LOGIC comments on Proposed Oil & Gas Regulations
Oct 16, 2019: the BOCC responded with a copy of their letter to Rick Casey, because he attended a BOCC Tuesday morning Oct 15, 2019 meeting, and pointed out the error about the letter missing on their website (described below). The letter basically states "we (the BOCC) do not believe...that suspending applications [i.e. drilling permits] is necessary..." To read the entire letter, see here.
Sept 10, 2019: the BOCC issued a formal response to the Alliance letter of 8/20/19. They did not respond in a letter, as was requested; instead, they had staff member Laurie Kadrich, Director of Community Planning, Infrastructure and Resources, prepare a letter, and read it during the meeting. The BOCC effectively denied the request for a moratorium -- but for rather flimsy reasons, based on bureaucratic technicalities, not on any strong moral or legal grounds.
The letter from Ms Kadrich is available on the BOCC website of past meetings; that agenda is here: https://apps.larimer.org/bcc/agenda_20190910.htm
the response, backdated to Sept 10, 2019 and signed by Tom Donnelly, basically repeats the response of the Commissioners: "that....suspending applications....is not necessary."
The audio recording of the meeting can be heard here, where the topic starts being discussed at about 40 minutes into the meeting.
Aug 22, 2019: The office of the BOCC sent their response in an email to the Larimer Alliance.
Aug 20, 2019: the Larimer Alliance submitted a formal request to impose a moratorium on any new drilling until the COGCC has completed its rulemaking to comply with SB-181. Read the letter here.