New Film Tells Story of Community’s Fight Against Fracking Waste

That is part of the message being delivered in a new documentary called “Hellbent” produced by Matthew Podolsky and directed by Justin Grubb and Annie Roth (with yours truly playing a small cameo role). However, the real stars of this amazing film are the aforementioned hellbender, Ohio State PhD candidate Matthew Kaunert, and courageous residents of Grant Township, like Judy Wanchisn and her daughter Stacy, who is the Supervising Vice-Chair of the town and has embraced the hellbender as part of her fight for her community’s water in the face of a proposal by Pennsylvania General Energy to build a Class II fracking waste disposal well near the town’s only source of freshwater, the Little Mahoning Creek, which also happens to be home to one of the last remaining populations of hellbender in Pennsylvania.

Anyone who is reading this is probably familiar with the perils of fracking waste production, transport, and disposal, but what you might not be familiar with is the fact that in states like Pennsylvania, the US EPA has regulatory primacy over injection wells. But as Grant Township resident Judy Wanchisn says in the film, “Profit motives are more important than the protective motives.” This fight got so bad for Stacy, Judy, and others that they began calling the EPA “Every Permit Approved.” However, in March 2020, these brave individuals won a major victory when the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection enforced the first-ever local Rights of Nature law and revoked PGE’s permit to build the toxic fracking waste disposal well.

Judy Wanchisn says it best, “We feel that we should be able to speak for the hellbender salamander, plant, water, whatever… We need to give a voice to the voiceless.”

Slated for release August 2022, “Hellbent” tells the story of the simultaneous struggle for community Home Rule and the need for muscular rights of nature laws to push back against the bullying tactics of the Oil & Gas industry nationwide. This is a wonderful tale of persistence and a deep local connection between humans and their natural environment that resulted in a significant loss for the Oil & Gas industry. At a time when there is so much bad news, this documentary allows us to celebrate a small town outside Pittsburgh, PA, where the power of the human spirit and a species on the brink of extinction are unsuspecting allies in the fight for a clean, livable environment.  In the words of the Sioux or Oceti Sakowin people, Mni Wiconi (“water is life”), and that life is more valuable than the short-term profits of the fossil fuel industry.