Today, Assembly Member O’Donnell celebrated New York’s official ban on hydraulic fracturing, a practice he has opposed for years. Assembly Member O’Donnell, a long-term member of the Assembly Committee on Environmental Conservation, reacted to the news:

I applaud the Department of Health and Governor Cuomo for protecting our state’s residents and environment from this destructive, dangerous practice. New Yorkers in my district and across the state have been united against hydrofracking for many years now, and I am overjoyed to hear that our efforts have finally been successful. I want to thank Assembly Member Bob Sweeney, Chair of the Environmental Conservation Committee, and Assembly Member Barbara Lifton, for their heroic efforts to stop hydrofracking. I could not be prouder that New York has shown itself to be a state where the people and the environment come before the oil and gas industry.

Assembly Member O’Donnell has been deeply engaged in the fight against hydrofracking for over five years. He has co-signed or sponsored himself a dozen bills to prevent hydrofracking and its attendant dangers; submitted testimony at and attended numerous public hearings regarding hydrofracking; and drafted and signed countless letters to Governors Paterson and Cuomo, as well as a number of high-ranking state and federal officials, urging them to recognize the dangers of fracking and the urgency with which it needed to be banned.