A Few Key Points

With regard to the Nov. 18 Butler Eagle article, Angry outburst gets speaker tossed out (see Media page), a few key points:

1. The e-mail mentioned in the article was not sent by me to the commissioners; it was an unauthorized sharing of a private e-mail, obviously sent via an unauthorized second, third or fourth party, which the commissioners chose to make public for their own purposes.
   
2. The phrase “extreme provocation” was taken entirely out of context in the article. Here is the entire quote: “I'm hoping to be able to keep the S27A folks reasonably restrained, even in the presence of such extreme provocation as the Marcellus Shale Coalition president.”  And with regard to Mr. Spigelmyer, all of us, even myself, were completely restrained.
3. The use of the word “crapload” in my private e-mail, as I explained to the commissioners at the meeting, was used in the typical slang fashion as meaning “a lot.” It was not a “bemoaning” of the fact that we would have to wait; it was merely letting people know that there would be a lot of agenda items and we would have to wait a good while before speaking. I explained to the commissioners that the use of this word was not to imply that the agenda items themselves were “crap” – indeed, they were not. None of that explanation was reported by the Eagle. If I had known that my private e-mail was going to be trotted out for public inspection by the commissioners and the Eagle, I certainly would have been more careful of my word choice.
4. Immediately before my statement to the commissioners during the public comment portion of the meeting I was subjected to a lengthy and varied personal attack by Comm. Joe Hasychak, of which the “crapload” complaint was only the beginning. This left me quite shaken and disassembled as I approached the podium to defend my private use of the word “crapload” and then proceeded with my prepared statement to the commissioners. This shaken state may perhaps explain, though by no means excuses, the indiscretion that would follow.
5. My use of the profanity “g-d” in reference to the township's drill-anywhere ordinance was not a part of my prepared statement to the commissioners, but came about as a result of a brief but heated exchange between myself and Comm. Dave Zarnick. The use of the word was regrettable; the reaction of township officials to the word was as though I had lunged at them with a knife. When it was suggested that I be escorted from the building, I accepted the invitation graciously and gratefully.
   
   

In summary, this whole incident was yet another example of the commissioners going to extreme lengths to divert attention from the fact that they have approved a shale gas drilling operation – the Krendale well pad – that is placed in dangerous proximity to a densely populated residential neighborhood.

Joseph