Linda Maio, Vice Mayor of Berkeley, spoke to the Planning commission.
After three years of study, the Benicia Planning Commission voted not to certify the final EIR and denied the Valero Crude-by-Rail on February 11, 2016. Read about the Planning Commission Resolution here.
Listen to the Chairman’s report to the City Council here. Read the rest of this entry »
Add your presence to the City Hall Chambers in Benicia as hearings on the Valero Crude-by-Rail Project begin before the City Council.
Dear oil train activist,
It’s your turn to speak out.
Benicia’s City Council is about to decide the fate of Davis area residents living in the blast zone.
Sign up NOW and GET ON THE BUS to the Benicia City Council hearing on April 4th.
Read the rest of this entry »
Over 300 people signed up to give testimony at the hearings in San Luis Obispo County regarding the Phillips 66 rail spur project.
Cross-posted from the Davis Vanguard on February 16, 2016
by Elizabeth Lasensky
The San Luis Obispo County Planning Commission and the City of Benicia Planning Commission heard public comment this month on two very similar oil train requests from refineries. Read the rest of this entry »
Ten Davis residents who followed the Benicia crude-by-rail project for years gave testimony in Benicia on the FEIR.
Reposted from the Davis Enterprise From page B5 | February 14, 2016 By Lynne Nittler and Jean Jackman
It has been an exhausting and dramatic week for Davis activists and those from Sacramento and other cities uprail from the proposed Valero Refinery expansion in Benicia.
Ten of us have traveled from Davis in two carpools to testify on the Valero crude-by-rail project. We have participated actively in the stages of a complicated public review process that began in 2013. Now, the final environmental impact report was up for a last public hearing before the Benicia Planning Commission.
Jean Jackman asks the Planning Commission to be good neighbors, moral people, and consider the health of all people along the rail.
Re: Public Comment delivered at Feb. 9, 2016 Planning Commission meeting. This is my written version of comments regarding the FEIR and the Valero Crude-by-Rail Project. Please note I have submitted letters to earlier drafts as well.
Good evening Commissioners. Thank you for you public service, dedication and endurance.
My name is Jean Jackman and I am your neighbor from Davis.
I am terrified at the prospect of 1.5 million gallons of oil rolling through my town twice a day. Read the rest of this entry »
Frances Burke urged the Planning Commission not to base their future on a dinosaur industry.
Good Evening, My name is Frances Burke I am from the City of Davis in Yolo County.
As has been brought to your attention, Davis is a uprail community . Oil mega trains headed to the Valero refinery will pass through our downtown and past my house.. I live in a UC Davis housing community and within 200 feet of the Union Pacific rail tracks. I can see and hear trains passing by all day and all night. With the Valero refinery and the crude oil trains it will bring, I will feel, smell, and taste the additional fumes and breath the additional particulate matter from the increased daily trains. I will hear and feel the increased train traffic every time they signal at a crossing, and I am a potential victim of a deadly accident, explosion or train derailment. Read the rest of this entry »
Dana Stokes spoke on the True Cost of Oil that must be paid by someone!
Dear Planning Commissioners,
Thank you for listening to my commentary this evening. Here is the written version of my comments regarding the Final Environmental Impact Report and the Valero Crude–by-Rail Project.
The True Cost of Oil – Who Pays?
I wish to address the section of the staff report entitled “Significant and Unavoidable Impacts (Impacts without Mitigation Measures)” beginning on page 26. The identified impacts are summarized for informational purposes only, as the staff report summarizes in several paragraphs why under federal preemption no mitigations of any kind can be offered for any of the impacts. Read the rest of this entry »
Nancy Price broadened the discussion to possible future sale of crude for direct transport overseas.
Good evening Commissioners,
Thank you for this opportunity as an up-rail Davis resident to speak.
As the final speaker among of Davis residents numbered 91-99 and a former City of Davis Planning Commissioner during the early 1990s, I have the utmost respect for the immense time, energy and attention to detail on a broad range of critical issues you have already spent on the EIR process for the Valero Benicia Crude-by-Rail project (the Project).
Carol Warren testified on the impacts of living very close to the train tracks in Dixon.
Dear Planning Commissioners,
My name is Carol Warren, and I am representing the Yolano group of Sierra Club. But mostly, I’m representing myself, because I live in Dixon, perhaps 50 yards from the tracks that carry the oil trains. There are 100 senior citizens living in my apartment complex. There is a trade school across the street, and an elementary school a block away. The tracks go right through downtown Dixon, where there are stores, businesses, a fairground, and churches. We are all in the blast zone for any accident in the Dixon city area.
Lynne Nittler organized the Davis carpools to Benicia.
Dear Planning Commission Members,
Thank you for this opportunity to address you. I am Lynne Nittler from Davis.
The Planning Department Staff Report suggests the only recourse for uprail residents facing “significant and unavoidable impacts” is to contact our congressional representatives and ask them to pass legislation for our safety. Staff also suggests that the Planning Commission write such a letter on our behalf.
I want to outline how responsive our CA and Congressional representatives have been in the last two and a half years, and how involved we have already been at the legislative level. It is partly because of that involvement that the uprail group from Davis asks you to not certify the EIR and to deny the Valero Crude-by-rail Project. Read the rest of this entry »
Yolano Climate Action Central 