Tweeti Blancett and family

Q: Tell me about your relationship with the oil and gas companies.
A: We had a wonderful relationship with the oil and gas industry for probably 35 of the last 50 years. They were partners, friends, neighbors. They understood stewardship of the land. They understood the precious resource of water, and they also understood who and what we were as people.

Q: Has the situation gotten better or worse with the Bush administration?
A: I don’t think it’s just this administration. I don’t believe this to be a Democrat or Republican issue, nor liberal or conservative [one] for that matter. I think what we are seeing is an industry that is the largest on the face of the Earth doing what it chooses to do. Last year my county, which is about the size of Connecticut, sent out 4.5 billion dollars [in oil and gas revenues]. One eighth of that was kept for the American people, for New Mexicans, and for private royalty owners like myself. [But] industry put 4.1 billion dollars in their pocket. With that kind of money, I feel like there’s no excuse for not taking care of the land, and the water, and the people on it. The issue we have with the oil and gas companies is that they are not following their own regulations.

The Blancetts were forced to sell their entire herd of cattle—a herd with bloodlines built up over six generations of ranching—rather than continue to lose animals from exposure to contamination by oil and gas development on their ranch

Q: What is the solution to making the oil and gas companies take accountability for their actions?
A: The administration, and in our case, the Bureau of Land Management, has to be willing to enforce the existing regulations. I’ll be the first to admit we don’t need any new rules or regulations, we just need to enforce what’s on the books. But more importantly, the corporate entities have to be willing to bring their wells into compliance. All the wells have regulations, and they are totally being ignored. As a result, damage to the land and the water and the wildlife, the livestock and the people, is occurring because big business is not stepping up to the plate and doing what’s right.

Q: What does your future hold?
A: We don’t intend to quit fighting, but we’re going to have to take this to a different plateau because going to Washington, going to Santa Fe, going to our local offices, it’s not working. They’re not interested in making changes so that the land, the water and the people can coexist. So we will be moving forward with legal action that says, "I’m sorry, you can’t treat people like this."