Pressure to Drill for Oil in Wildlife Refuge

John Balzar’s article read like an oil-industry handout.

He was obviously taken in by the dog-and-pony show presented by the Arctic oil interests. They somehow convinced him that enormous pressures were building up to open the range to oil drilling. They employed an obviously compromised Fish-and-Wildlife “scientist” to support their specious argument that development will not unduly harm the wildlife habitat.

It’s too bad that Balzar didn’t do his homework and review the 10-year debate on the development of the range, the volumes of testimony contained in environmental impact statements, the interests of Alaska Natives in the area or Canada’s strong opposition to the development of the caribou-calving areas.

The dependence of about 40 Alaskan and Canadian Native communities occupying an area the size of Indiana on the annual migration of the Porcupine caribou herd is one of the great natural wonders of the world. In the absence of any national energy policy governing oil use and development, the complicity of your paper in the industry’s brazen exploitation of the Mideast crisis to sustain its attack on the environment is astonishing.

WILLIAM H. DuBAY

Torrance