Letter: Writer off the mark about who control oil development

In a letter Thursday, Chris Deery stated that North Dakota needs to be smarter and slow down oil development.

Speaking as someone living in Dickinson, I think this probably sounds appealing to a lot of people. But, there is a pretty serious challenge in doing it.

The vast majority of land being developed for oil is private property. How is the state legally and ethically going to determine which landowners can benefit from their property and which ones can’t?

Some suggest we slow down permitting. That’s a fine idea except that if an applicant meets all the pre-determined criteria, how can the state refrain from granting it?

I’ll put it this way, what if we had too much traffic on the rod, so the state arbitrarily stopped granting new drivers their licenses, even if they had passed the required tests? There are definitely challenges right now due to the pace of growth but saying the governor and the state aren’t being smart about it is far from the truth.

Jaden Weiss, New Salem, is a Dickinson State University student

Tags: opinion, letter, letters