Follow county commission approvals to track local projects

Screenshot from PublicSource's story of a mobile park scheduled to become a water-pumping station for natural gas drilling. Photo by Lynn Johnson

After reading a recent story about poor conditions at some mobile home parks, I came across Halle Stockton’s PublicSource report that highlighted another issue for trailer park residents: evictions. 

Her story features the sale of a mobile home park that will become a water-pumping station for natural gas drilling. The sale meant owners - who didn’t own the land where their homes sat and paid about $200 a month to lease the land – had to move, Halle writes.

Halle says she got a tip from a photographer working on a documentary project about the impact of Marcellus Shale drilling and pipeline building.

When Halle started reporting the story, only seven of the initial 32 trailers were left. Some residents were wary of talking with her, but relented after she visited for three days.

Halle Stockton

Halle suggests reporters pay attention to projects being approved by local commissions. She notes in her story that the county planning commission approved plans to build a pump station a week before the mobile home park owners sold the land. When projects get approved, she says reporters should find out how the land was being used.

She also suggests reporters look at the tangential operations of hydraulic fracking. “Our minds go straight to the drill site,” she says. “But, what are things going on around that to make it operational?”

Looking at the planned use of the mobile park land, for instance, led to a separate story about the possible impact of pumping water from rivers. Halle’s story notes the Susquehanna River Basin Commission had “approved water extractions totaling about 91 million gallons daily from 173 river locations for natural gas well development at nearly 2,000 drilling sites.”