And Join Us in Lansing on November 27 to Fight the Line 5 Tunnel Scheme and Protect the Mackinac Bridge
FLOW is urging supporters to contact your Michigan lawmakers today using our template message as a starting point, and to join FLOW and the other leaders of the Oil & Water Don’t Mix campaign who are hosting a Line 5 lawmaker lobby day for Tuesday, November 27, in Lansing, to fight for the Great Lakes and the Mackinac Bridge by opposing Governor Snyder’s Enbridge oil tunnel scheme and shutting down Line 5 in the Mackinac Straits.
Use our updated Line 5 oil tunnel fact sheet to get informed and share with your lawmakers and others who can help stand up for the Great Lakes and the Mighty Mac.
In coordination with the Snyder administration, departing State Sen. Tom Casperson, a Republican from Escanaba, on November 8 introduced Senate Bill 1197 to amend the Mackinac Bridge Authority Act to allow it to own and operate a “utility tunnel,” with the Enbridge Line 5 oil pipeline as the intended occupant. There’s also the uncertain prospect of adding gas or electric lines, which could rent space in the tunnel by paying Enbridge, not the bridge authority that is proposed to own it.
The Michigan Senate could quickly approve the bill in the lame duck session after Thanksgiving, and send it to the House. Gov. Snyder is seeking to sign and tie the hands of the incoming administration of Governor-elect Gretchen Whitmer and Attorney General-elect Dana Nessel, who both campaigned for shutting down Line 5, not replacing it with a tunnel. Gov. Snyder also released a draft of a third oil tunnel agreement with Enbridge, which Senate Bill 1197 seeks to enact.
Click here for FLOW’s summary of recent action at the November 8 meeting of the Mackinac Bridge Authority. Stay tuned to the FLOW website for deeper analysis of Senate Bill 1197 and the third oil tunnel agreement, and more steps that citizens, communities, and businesses can take to protect the Great Lakes and the Mighty Mac.
There is no risk low enough to justify continuing to expose Michigan-Huron Lakes to oil and gas leak potential. The lakes are the reason that we all live, work and play here. Large environmental disasters do happen, and when they do the areas affected are large and recovery time can be generational. No tunnel. No pipeline.