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Protester signals to passing traffic at the edge of Monday's rally alongside Rt. 14.

250 rally at Crestwood gate

Protest storage plan; Resistance Pledge circulated

WATKINS GLEN, Aug. 19 -- An estimated 250 regional residents opposed to the Crestwood plan to store LPG gas in salt caverns on the west side of Seneca Lake took their protest Monday back to the gate leading to Crestwood's Seneca Lake Compressor Station on property along Rt. 14 north of Watkins Glen.

This time -- unlike in two previous instances -- there was no intent to block traffic into the site, nor did anybody lock themselves to the fence. And this time there was no police presence, other than a late visit by a trooper and a deputy to advise a woman displaying a sign in the highway median that she could not do so there.

But civil disobedience leading to possible arrest was in the air as the gathering -- upset by a report that Crestwood intended to start construction that very day on a compressor station that would pressurize natural gas for the salt caverns -- was urged by one of the speakers, Ithaca College professor Sandra Steingraber, to adopt a Pledge to Protect Seneca Lake, also called a Pledge of Resistance.

The pledge, which can be found and signed at tinyurl.com/PledgeToResistCrestwood, says in part that "I pledge to join with others in this region and elsewhere to engage in peaceful, nonviolent acts of protest, up to and including civil disobedience, until additional storage of LPG and methane in Seneca Lake salt caverns is halted."

Those words, "civil disobedience," were also employed by another of the protester's own who warned that they should steel themselves for arrest in the future. Retired Philadelphia police captain Ray Lewis, who stood among the rally protesters dressed in his old police uniform, is a regular at such rallies, according to Joseph Campbell, president and co-founder of Gas Free Seneca, a leading organization in the fight against the Crestwood plan.

Lewis, who said he moved to upstate several years ago, told the gathering -- after several speeches had been presented -- that "you need to start mentally preparing yourselves to be arrested for civil disobedience. This" -- and he waved at the people and signs around him -- "is not going to stop them."

The message contrasted with the more peaceful themes followed throughout the rally by its organizers and speakers. Campbell said he had reached agreement with the Sheriff's Department for the event as long as everyone behaved themselves. "They gave us their blessing" for the rally, he said, "as long as we don't trespass and don't block that." And he pointed to the driveway and gate leading to the Crestwood property.

That was the site early in the protest movement -- going back to 2012 -- in which first a dozen, and later a handful of protesters were arrested for blocking the gate and chaining themselves to it. Three of the initial protesters chose jail rather than pay the requisite fine for trespass.

On this day, though, the protesters stayed on grass outside the Crestwood property, and let a Crestwood vehicle enter the grounds through the gate without interference.

Campbell served as emcee, introducing several speakers familiar to the cause, including Steingraber, Rochester radio personality Michael Warren Thomas, Seneca County legislator Steve Churchill, Eagle Crest Vineyards owner William Ouweleen, Gas Free Seneca co-founder Yvonne Taylor, and retired Cayuga Medical Center CEO Rob Mackenzie.

Each decried the reported plan by Crestwood to start construction on its natural gas-storage expansion project in an evident snub of a New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) decision last week that called for an "issues conference" to determine if there are any significant and substantive issues regarding the storage of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) that might require an adjudicatory hearing.

The expected Crestwood move, said Gas Free Seneca's Taylor, was "in utter disregard for the state, for the law and for the region."

Steingraber put it in different terms.

"This is a cynical swapping out of one gas for another to do an end run around the decision to call a temporary halt to this practice," she said, adding that it demonstrates "a flagrant disregard to the will of the people of science, of local elected officials, business owners, wineries and maybe even the DEC itself." The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) regulates natural gas, while the DEC regulates liquefied petroleum gas.

Crestwood plans to use depleted caverns for both. Protests have resulted on various occasions, with participants including many area business owners.

"We're sending out an SOS here," said Steingraber, noting that Crestwood has been emboldened by FERC's willingness to approve its natural gas storage.

To the Houston-based Crestwood company, she said: "Seneca Lake is not the Houston shipping channel; it’s our drinking water."

And to her fellow protesters, she urged that they "not only pursue all possible avenues and turn over all possible stones, write all possible letters, make all possible phone calls but, if necessary, use your bodies and your voices in the American tradition of civil disobedience to show the world that we New Yorkers can't be messed with."

Mackenzie outlined the analysis he recently crafted that says the chance of a catastrophic accident resulting from the storage of propane in salt caverns is 35% in the next 25 years. "The only way to avoid an accident is not to allow LPG in salt caverns," he said. "I agree with Gas Free Seneca. Crestwood should go home."

Ouweleen invited everyone to his winery on Hemlock Lake on Sunday, Aug. 24 for a Save Seneca Lake Letter Writing Party in which he would provide pizza and beverages. The idea, he said, is to contact not only state but federal representatives -- in particular Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.

Crestwood, meanwhile, issued a statement later in the day saying that construction had not started on its natural gas project and won't until it receives a green light from FERC.

Said Crestwood:

"The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) recently authorized a small expansion of our Seneca Lake natural gas storage facility. The FERC order authorizing the expansion requires us to file an implementation plan for the environmental and engineering conditions contained in the order. We filed our implementation plan last week, and we cannot commence construction until the FERC approves our plan."

Photos in text:

From top: Sandra Steingraber addresses the rally, as did, in order: retired Philadelphia police captain Ray Lewis; Gas Free Seneca co-founder Yvonne Taylor; Gas Free Seneca co-founder Joseph Campbell, introducing (rear) Rochester radio personality Michael Warren Thomas; and Eagle Crest Vineyards owner William Ouweleen.

Left: One of the protest signs. Right. Lee McCaslin sings a song to the Ottawa Nation spirits.

Left: A trooper advises protester Roz Richter of Ithaca that she can no longer stand in the median, where she was displaying a sign. Right: After the rally, a breather.

An LPG truck passes by the rally site.

Some of the many signs on display at the rally.