Grassroots Ad Hoc Group Keeps 13,000 Acres Lease Free – For Now
By Jeremy S.
When gas lease negotiators come to the doors of residents in Otego, NY, they’ll find that money talks and bad lease offers walk.
The gas companies will have Dick Downe and Anna Hein, founders of the Otego Area Landowners Association, to thank. The two started the association when a company offered their neighbor a lease for $25 an acre. “I had read about $1,500 and $2,500 leases in The Family Times, so I rushed down there to tell him he was being snookered, but it was too late. He’d already signed,” said Downe.
Other groups had held meetings at local high schools, but none organized landowners successfully.
On July 21, Downe and Hein began the association, hoping to prevent other individuals from signing the boiler-plate leases, which they say are “all skewed for the gas companies.”
They also claimed that initially, people “didn’t know what they were signing, and signed away their water rights.”
After finding that contiguous acres were more important than the sheer number, they prioritized membership locally. Currently, 13,000 acres are organized in the association just within in the town of Otego. Among methods the association used for promotion was Burma Shave-style signs along the country roads in Otego, each with one word, to spell out “Don’t sign lease yet.”
When the group was initially formed, members agreed to hold off from leasing pending a presentation given by a geologist and a lawyer. But according to Downe, they resolved that they “don’t need a geologist anymore. People know what’s going on; the price is now what matters.” The group has hired a lawyer, Scott Kurkowski, an attorney from Levine, Goulden, and Thompson of Binghamton, to represent them and negotiate the best lease possible from gas companies.
Results are already visible. “There seems to be a gentleman’s agreement between gas companies for what area is targeted by which company. Lenape Energy has a full-court press going in the Otego area via mass-mailings and calling around the clock. Our pushback as an organization has made them sweeten their deal in monetary terms and start answering our concerns,” explained Downe. The group is now in the process of looking over real applications.
Although their primary concern is to negotiate the best financial deal, environmental concerns have come into play. They gave testimony at the New York State Assembly Committee on Environmental Protection on October 15, the Susquehanna River Basin Commission hearings in Albany on October 22, and the Department of Environmental Conservation’s hearings on December 2 in Oneonta.
“We’re a local organization and we love our land. We’re up here for a reason; it’s a beautiful place to live,” said Downe.
For more information, visit http://sites.google.com/site/otegogasleasegroup.
