GOLCONDA, Ill. – Dear Governor Hickenlooper, a collection of documentary films directed by a variety of Colorado filmmakers, provides a new perspectives on fracking and clean energy through the eyes of scientists, entrepreneurs, artists, and families. The film, addressed to Colorado’s governor, is showing for the first time outside of Colorado in Illinois this week.
The Shawnee Sentinels are hosting a free screening of Dear Governor Hickenlooper at the Riverview Mansion in Golconda, Illinois.
Dear Governor Hickenlooper introduces audiences to an ex-gas worker turned whistle blower, Aaron Milton; Cornell’s Professor of Engineering, Anthony Ingraffea, who sheds new light on gas well failures; Dr. Theo Colburn on how fracking affects our children’s health; a family whose dreams are broken when the gas company moves in next door. Shane Davis, a.k.a. “The Fractivist”, is Dear Governor Hickenlooper’s protagonist, taking the audience from one story to the next while elucidating well site visits and statistics from the Colorado Oil and Gas Commission’s own accident data.
“With 52,000 active wells in Colorado and 3000-4000 more coming on line every year, the stories of how fracking is impacting real people’s lives across the state are unfolding daily,” states Stash Wislocki, the director of Dear Governor Hickenlooper. Anti-fracking groups across Illinois want to show the public that fracking is not all it’s cracked up to be and are asking the public to look and listen to other communities that have experienced industrialized hydraulic fracturing and the effects it has had on the surrounding area.
“The science has shown fracking causes earthquakes, increased respiratory problems for nearby citizens, increased asthma for children and increased endocrine diseases. We wish Governor Quinn and elected officials would look seriously at the recent research and consider the true cost and negative long term side effects of this process,” says Tabitha Tripp, spokesperson for Shawnee Sentinels.
The film also emphasizes renewable energy potential, and examines the reasons renewable energy development across the country isn’t on-par with many countries in Europe that get 50-80 percent of their power from renewable sources today.
“Experts like Stanford’s Dr. Mark Jacobson, who is featured in Dear Governor Hickenlooper, declare it is possible, today, to be powered 100 percent by renewable energy, but we simply lack the political will to do so, I can’t help but ask this question,” said Allison Wolff, producer of Dear Governor Hickenlooper: “Why would we permanently poison our water, our air, and our communities for the short-term gain of a handful of oil companies and politicians when it is possible to have clean energy right now?”
The film shows Wednesday, November 12, at 6:30 pm at the Riverview Mansion in Golconda in Pope County.
Learn more at www.deargovernorhickenlooper.com.
Sponsoring organizations are:
Shawnee Sentinels