FGCU Gets Recognized for Enviro Sustainability Despite Frackers on Board of Trustees

By Lou Saboter

FGCU was recognized by the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) with a gold rating as part of its STARS (Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System) program. The STARS program helps to "set and meet sustainability goals", according to a statement by Katie Leone, FGCU's Sustainability Coordinator.

However, to argue that FGCU is an environmentally conscious school is ludicrous considering that the school is tied up with efforts to drill and frack Southwest Florida, which activities have been demonstrated to poison groundwater, disturb habitats, and create earthquakes, or frackquakes. Furthermore, FGCU is often instrumental in other development efforts. which is no surprise considering the makeup of its Board of Trustees, and the presence of a Florida State Representative as an employee who has pushed fracking industry friendly legislation.

To see the degree to which FGCU is being used for green-washing purposes, first consider that the school is dedicated to environmental sustainability in its mission statement.  This dedication is somehow supposed to be represented by the presence of two executives in Collier family companies who make up part of its Board of Trustees: Christian Spilker and Blake Gable. The Collier family has been pursuing the dream of Barron Gift Collier by leasing out hundreds of thousands of acres to oil companies.

One company they leased to, Dan A. Hughes Co., almost immediately fracked and has since been sued by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.

Also, in the interest of pursuing Barron Gift Collier's dream, 4 Colliers contributed a mere $200,000 to Rick Scott's campaign shortly before he appointed Blake Gable and Christian Spilker to the FGCU Board of Trustees.

Christian Spilker, soon before that, has made the following statement:

Apparently, since a member of the Board of Trustees was saying this, we were all supposed to take it to the bank.Hilariously, the Colliers, being old school oil boys, must know for a fact that they ALWAYS FRACK, as is explained here:

But, guess what, they always acid frack and they don't tell you. The DEP even acts like it has no idea that this is the case, when they know it is. Why? Because they're not legally required to tell you.

Furthermore, the DEP, which suddenly needed to seem like a responsible agency with Rick Scott's election coming up and all, may have gone after Dan A. Hughes, but the plug on fracking has not yet been pulled. In fact, there's an acid fracking operation that was thrown up right behind Sunshine Elementary.

It's really not that surprising that this sort of thing is going on at FGCU. It's going on all over the country. Obama practically made fracking and solar energy sound like the same thing, as does this FPL commercial.

This is all because of money. Campaign contributions and lobbying come from corporations, and politicians and even "environmental" organizations are all on board. Plus, the EPA barely regulates fracking.

So, you may need to see things from the point of view of the people adversely affected by fracking to fully appreciate the problem.
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