Peter Mantius: Crestwood LPG won robo-approval - FOIL proves that there are no records showing that the Board of Regents has appointed a “state geologist” or “acting state geologist” since 2010
Gov. Andrew Cuomo should waste no time resolving the latest controversy over a Texas company’s application for a permit to store liquid petroleum gas, or LPG, in unlined salt caverns next to Seneca Lake. At issue is whether a specifically designated “state geologist” has a legal responsibility to conduct a rigorous analysis of such potentially dangerous activity or whether a simple undocumented sign-off by — well, anybody — will do. In its six-year bid to win that underground storage permit, Crestwood Equity Partners has made a practice of hiding documents, fudging facts and co-opting state regulators and local officials. Last week the company was called to task by the Seneca Lake Pure Waters Association for dodging a fundamental rule of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. The first sentence of the DEC’s “underground gas storage permitting process” states that such permits may only be granted with “approval in writing from the State Geologist.” SLPWA notes th
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