We, the below signed faith leaders and faith communities, support the Clean Water for the Woodlands fundraiser.
 
Imagine being deprived of clean water. Imagine living in a house where drinking a glass of water from the tap or taking a shower or even flushing a toilet are activities too risky to attempt. Now imagine what it would be like to live that way for not days or weeks or even months, but years.
 
That is precisely the plight of families in towns and rural communities across the shale fields of Pennsylvania where modern oil and gas drilling techniques have turned them into industrialized wastelands. The problem is particularly acute in an area of Butler County, where fracking fouled the well water of several dozen families in a community called the Woodlands six years ago. To date, families in the Woodlands still rely on a weekly donation of 20 gallons of clean water for drinking, cooking, and brushing their teeth, which they receive from volunteers operating a water bank at the nearby White Oak Springs Presbyterian Church. This falls far short of what the American Red Cross considers the minimum required for an emergency – two gallons per person per day.

The Woodlands community has gone far too long without the help they need from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania’s faith community is stepping in where Governor Tom Wolf has not, and will be holding a fundraiser for the month of January with the goal of raising $5,000 for the Woodlands community. This would provide five months of clean water for the residents of the Woodlands.

We support this effort, and we call on Governor Wolf to take long overdue action. If Governor Wolf won’t hold the industry accountable for the contamination, then he must take the burden off of volunteers and set aside funds in his proposed 2017 budget to provide ongoing help to the Woodlands and communities like it that have been adversely impacted by fracking.