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More Happy News for Mayor on Fracking

By Kay Stubbs

(As part of our continuing Happy News series we have written this fictional account. The story itself is not true but we are told we need more happy news.)

Niagara Falls Mayor, Paul A. Dyster, responding to certain criticisms that he is a closet proponent for the treatment of fracking waste water at the Niagara Falls water treatment plant, said, "Why can't the Niagara Falls Reporter just support me like the other newspapers do?"

"Fracking" is a process that involves pumping millions of gallons of water mixed with chemicals miles under the earth's surface to "fracture" the shale and release natural gas which is then piped to the surface. The leftover millions of gallons of water is toxic and must be recovered, treated, and then released into other people's waterways or it will seep into the aquifer and the people near the fracking wells will wind up being poisoned, getting sick and then, unhappily, dying.

While fracking is illegal in New York, the treatment of frack waste water is not.

"I never said I supported treating frack water, neither have I said I am against it," said the hoopster tall mayor. "You can quote me on that, for now."

Dyster, a former college professor who was at one time in charge of filling the vending machines in the state department's cafeteria in Geneva, Switzerland, a position he has described on his resume as "an international nuclear arms limitation negotiator," said he is going to form a 'mayor's blue ribbon panel' to study the issue of treating other states' frack water and releasing it into the Niagara River.

The mayor, who has been described as a "secular Mahatma Gandhi," said detractors refer to his panel of experts as "Dyster's Pabst Blue Ribbon panel," an obvious reference to the mayor's position as a CBJP National Certified Beer Judge and connoisseur of bottled suds.

"Sure, there will be suds in the Niagara River after frack water is treated here, but the treatment of radioactive toxic waste water in municipal water treatment plants should not be compared to dumping beer into the human system," said the Mensa-IQ-equivalent mayor. "There is no consensus of tests proving that treating fracking waste water is safe or unsafe. We must take specific, measurable, quantifiable, calculated, plainly-scoped, theoretically-scientific risks in order to better fulfill the promise of the opportunities we can hope will be afforded to us."

Known as the "green mayor," Dyster said environmentalists can confidently rely on his judgment.

"When it comes to being an effective elected official, I am as green as they come," said Dyster.

While water rates will undoubtedly remain the same for the average resident, the good news about the Niagara Falls Water Board accepting fracking waste water is that the executives at the water board will see big boosts in their salaries.

The profits from accepting fracking water from Pennsylvania, Ohio and, if it gets approved, New York State, will allow these trained professionals at the Water Board to achieve the pay rates that frackers get in the private sector.

Happily the discharge of frack waste water taken in at Niagara Falls and treated at the Buffalo Avenue Plant will easily go downstream and, if it does pollute any of the river, it will be the Lower River and little pollution will be seen in Niagara Falls. The rapids will take most of the briny, toxin- laden radioactive wastewater over the falls and by the time it settles in the Lower River it will already be in Lewiston.

Communities served by the Niagara County Water Authority can figure out what to do with it then.

 

 

Niagara Falls Reporter - Publisher Frank Parlato Jr. www.niagarafallsreporter.com

Feb 11, 2014