Archive
Subscribe Place Ad Buy Trib Photos Readers' Choice Contests
Jobs Homes Autos Classifieds
Trib Total Media Contact Us
ShareThis Page
Community meeting set in Oakmont to discuss proposed oil and gas well ordinance | TribLIVE.com
Plum/Oakmont

Community meeting set in Oakmont to discuss proposed oil and gas well ordinance

Michael DiVittorio
Michael DiVittorio | Tuesday, September 25, 2018 5:24 p.m
271851oakmontborough

A community meeting to discuss a proposed oil and gas well ordinance is set for Wednesday at the Oakmont Elks Club.

It’s slated for 7 p.m. at 106 Washington Ave. and presented by Citizens to Protect Oakmont and Food & Water Watch.

The former is a group of concerned residents dedicated to preserving the health and safety of the community. The latter is a national organization that advocates on behalf of residents in regards to clean food and water.

Megan McDonough, municipal ordinance project organizer with Food & Water, said the goal of the meeting is to educate residents on the proposed borough law in preparation for council’s public hearing and possible vote 7 p.m. Oct. 9 at the borough building, 767 Fifth St.

She said the three areas of concern are the 500-foot state minimum setback regulation, the exemption of borough property and lack of definition and regulations for other oil and gas infrastructure such as compressor stations.

Some residents at previous council meetings said they would like to see a 2,000-foot setback restriction.

“Residents want Oakmont council to pass an ordinance that they believe adequately protects the residents for generations to come,” said McDonough of Elizabeth Township. “If the ordinance passed, as it stands, we don’t believe that ordinance at this time meets those goals.”

Council voted in December to adopt a pending ordinance and sent it to the planning commission for review.

The commission has since sent a draft back to the borough for consideration. It was posted to the borough’s website and submitted to Allegheny County Economic Development Planning Manager Kay Pierce for further comments.

Oakmont is 1.8 square miles of mostly densely-populated residential areas. Its industrial area is near the Allegheny River and light industrial is by Creek Side Park.

The planning commission’s ordinance revisions is available at bit.ly/2wc1cY6.

More information about Food & Water Watch is available at foodandwaterwatch.org.

Michael DiVittorio is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Michael at 412-871-2367, mdivittorio@tribweb.com or via Twitter @MikeJdiVittorio.

Michael DiVittorio is a Tribune-Review staff reporter. You can contact Michael at 412-871-2367, mdivittorio@tribweb.com or via Twitter .

Categories: Plum
TribLIVE commenting policy

You are solely responsible for your comments and by using TribLive.com you agree to our Terms of Service.

We moderate comments. Our goal is to provide substantive commentary for a general readership. By screening submissions, we provide a space where readers can share intelligent and informed commentary that enhances the quality of our news and information.

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderating decisions are subjective. We will make them as carefully and consistently as we can. Because of the volume of reader comments, we cannot review individual moderation decisions with readers.

We value thoughtful comments representing a range of views that make their point quickly and politely. We make an effort to protect discussions from repeated comments either by the same reader or different readers

We follow the same standards for taste as the daily newspaper. A few things we won't tolerate: personal attacks, obscenity, vulgarity, profanity (including expletives and letters followed by dashes), commercial promotion, impersonations, incoherence, proselytizing and SHOUTING. Don't include URLs to Web sites.

We do not edit comments. They are either approved or deleted. We reserve the right to edit a comment that is quoted or excerpted in an article. In this case, we may fix spelling and punctuation.

We welcome strong opinions and criticism of our work, but we don't want comments to become bogged down with discussions of our policies and we will moderate accordingly.

We appreciate it when readers and people quoted in articles or blog posts point out errors of fact or emphasis and will investigate all assertions. But these suggestions should be sent via e-mail. To avoid distracting other readers, we won't publish comments that suggest a correction. Instead, corrections will be made in a blog post or in an article.