The Los Angeles Times interviewed Manatt's Craig Moyer, chair of the firm's Land, Environment and Natural Resources division, for an article on San Benito County's growing movement to ban hydraulic fracturing via local voter initiatives.
The Los Angeles Times reports that fracking opponents in San Benito County, one of California's smallest counties, managed to draw 57% of county voters to the polls and hold off oil companies opposing the initiative to ban well stimulation techniques. Mendocino County also approved a fracking ban earlier this month. And in Santa Barbara, opponents of a ban poured $6 million into a successful effort that turned back a similar initiative.
Moyer told the newspaper that the initiatives are unnecessary because of comprehensive fracking regulations that lawmakers approved earlier this year, which are expected to be fully implemented in 2015.
"The state has addressed it," Moyer said. "I'm kind of amazed that it has gotten to be as much of an issue as it has. I'm hopeful that it will fade away and people will move on."
Read the article here.