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ARTICLE · 13 MAY 2014

Anti-Fracking Bylaws: US Lawyer Wins Green Nobel Prize

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Helen Slottje, a lawyer in Ithaca, New York, was recently awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize for her work.

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Helen Slottje, a lawyer in Ithaca, New York, was recently awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize for her work "helping towns across New York defend themselves from oil and gas companies by passing local bans on fracking" (the US equivalent of anti-fracking bylaws).  Her legal research concluded that individual townships could use zoning laws, through "home rule", to ban fracking within their borders, to protect local air and water quality.  More than 170 towns and cities in New York have passed local ordinances prohibiting fracking based on her innovative legal framework. The ordinances have been upheld by two levels of court, and will soon be reconsidered by the New York Court of Appeals.

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