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What Have They Been Smoking? |
May 16, 2008
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It would be wrong for me to suggest that County Commissioners Craig Meis and Janet Rowland have been smoking crack taken leave of their senses, so I'm not going to do that. It would be rude for me to even ask the question (Have they?), so I'm not going to do that either. Rather, I'll leave it to each readers to use his or her imagination.
Today, the Daily Sentinel reported that Meis and Rowland think that oil and gas drilling pads are good for wildlife. Why do they think that? Because wildlife is often spotted near drilling pads.
Never mind that I have counseled time and time again that one should never confuse correlation with causation.
Today, I was driving up 27 Road and there was a dead cat smeared all over the middle of the street. Cat? Street? Proximity? Does that mean that 27 Road is good for cats?
I'll leave it to my readers to argue that point. I have nothing factual to offer.
In the same vein, I suggest that neither Meis nor Rowland has anything factual to offer in the discussion of whether drill pads are beneficial to wildlife. Meis is a chemical engineer, Rowland is an alleged family therapist. Neither knows jack shit about wildlife, unless, of course, you're willing to give Rowland credit for her unique perspective on sheep.
That's sort of my point.
Last year, the State Legislature said that Colorado needed to consider impacts on wildlife before it granted drilling permits.
That seems simple enough.
You want to know about wildlife? Ask a wildlife biologist.
However, that only works if you suspect that Craig Meis might not really be smarter than everyone else. But he is--just ask him. And ask Janet Rowland too. She's perfectly willing to defer to Craig Meis on matters about which neither he nor she knows a damned thing.
In today's Sentinel article, Leroy Standish, to his credit, finally asked someone besides Craig Meis what he thinks. (Standish must be getting the message. He even got a whole article out of the deal.) One of the people he asked was Randy Hampton of the Division of Wildlife. Hampton said, if you'll grant me the luxury of paraphrasing, that Meis was smoking crack wrong. Drill pads aren't really good for wildlife.
Having gone all around the mulberry bush with this discussion, let me suggest that this is exactly what the State Legislature had in mind last year when it wanted wildlife experts to weigh in on drilling permits. If you want to know about impacts on wildlife, don't ask engineers, don't ask crackheads County Commissioners, ask the Division of Wildlife and/or the Wildlife Commission.
While the Division and the Commission might not always subscribe to Kathy Hall's talking points, they do seem to know a thing or two about deer and elk.
Maybe that's why the State Legislature said experts should be asked. And why the Legislature never once suggested asking Craig Meis or Janet Rowland.
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