At a news conference in Annapolis on Friday, Hogan said that he was throwing his support behind a bill sponsored by Sen. Robert Zirkin, D-Baltimore County, that would permanently ban the energy-extraction practice in Maryland, saying that “Protecting our environment, and making it cleaner and healthier has been one of the top priorities of our administration.”
Maryland currently has a moratorium on fracking that is set to expire in October, and fracking has never been executed in the state. The Hogan administration had proposed a set of regulations on the practice that “would have made it virtually impossible for anyone to ever engage in fracking in Maryland,” Hogan said.
“Our administration proposed the toughest fracking regulations in all 50 states,” the governor said. “… However, the legislature has failed to enact these tough regulations. That’s why I’ve decided that we must take the next step from virtually banning fracking to actually banning fracking.”
He claimed that Sens. Paul Pinsky, D-Prince George’s County, and Senate President Mike Miller, D-Calvert County, and others, were “working on a plan that would that open the door for fracking.”
Therefore, “I have decided to announce my full support for the Maryland fracking ban which has been sponsored by Sen. Bobby Zirkin of Baltimore County,” Hogan said.
Pinsky and Miller are listed as co-sponsors of Zirkin’s bill. It’s still in committee in the Senate; a ban has already passed the House.
Click here to read the rest of the article written by Kate Ryan over at WTOP