This book has just won the Pulitzer. Amity and Prosperity, PA lie just north of the West Virginia line, due south of Pittsburgh in Washington County. From 2005 to 2015, the fracking revolution prospered in southwestern PA. It was not virgin territory for its lands and streams were laced with the detritus of a century of oil, gas and coal extraction residue. Fracking in PA has become a great political, Republican v. Democratic, rich v. poor, urban v. rural point of contention. This is the story of one family and the consequences of fracking on their lives.
Stacey Haney, a nurse at Washington Hospital, lived with her son, Harley, and her daughter, Paige. She owned eight acres of land near Amity and signed a lease with Range Resources in the waning days of 2008. Soon, hundreds of trucks passing each day wrecked the roads, and bridges, destroyed the house's foundation, and filled her house with dirt. In late 2009, a well on the next farm pumped over 3 million gallons of water and chemicals and 4 million clay pellets into the earth. Soon thereafter, her seventh grade son became seriously ill. A toxic pond of chemical sludge up on the rig site began to reek. Their pets began to die and Harley was diagnosed with arsenic poisoning. Range replaced their well water with trucked in potable water that made a major difference in all their lives. But they were far from healthy and Stacey began to worry about what they were breathing, just 1,000 yards downwind from the sludge pond. She arranged for a series of extensive blood and urine tests. Among other toxins, they all had glycol in their bodies in alarming amounts.
In the spring of 2011, Stacey engaged a local Washington PA law firm and moved out of her house. She and Paige moved in with her parents in Amity. She had Harley stay with her boyfriend in Eighty-Four. He was so ill that the physician said he had to be beyond a
10-mile radius of their home. Stacey's neighbor sued the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection to try to compel them to do their job and the attorneys began to prepare for the much larger job of suing Range Resources on behalf of a number of the locals. John and Kendra Smith, the husband and wife team representing the plaintiffs, were soon spending an extraordinary amount of time and effort on the case. As the Haney's all continued with varying and different ailments, the Smith's filed Haney v. Range in May, 2012. They cast a wide net, suing Range, the suppliers of every component in the process, water test labs, and individual executives. Concurrent with the Haney case was their writ of mandamus directed at the DEP and a lawsuit that successfully had most of a law passed to assist the drillers declared unconstitutional. The suit dragged on as the defendants relied on the time-honored corporate defense of wearing down the plaintiffs and their lawyers. In June of 2014, a chink in the defendant's armor appeared when the industry friendly DEP fined Range $4.15 million for five leaking waste ponds, one of which was the one next to the Haney's home. It proved to be the highpoint of the battle with Range. The grind went on and on and reached an undisclosed settlement in early 2018 that left the plaintiffs dejected. Obviously, this is a well-written, excellent book, but one without the requisite positive ending. The deceit evidenced by the industry in this instance and the willingness of government to look away and do anything for jobs and tax revenue is quite discouraging.
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