Conroe council rescinds Blackfin permits, issues stop-work order and adopts ordinance limiting oil-and-gas facilities

The Conroe City Council voted Oct. 9 to rescind all city permits issued to Whitewater, Blackfin Pipeline and Montgomery Investments LLC and to issue an immediate stop-work order, city officials said.

City administrator McCheska told the council staff recommended rescinding the permits to comply with a Montgomery County District Court order and because of recent developments with the project. "The site right now does not have any workers on it," McCheska said; staff reported monitoring the site and that some contractor equipment had been removed.

The council also adopted an ordinance that requires city council review of permits for facilities related to pipelines — including compressor stations, processing facilities and storage — and sets a 2,000-foot minimum setback from inhabited structures with notice extended to property owners within 3,000 feet. Assistant city staff described the measure as giving council discretion to require greater buffers when safety or development considerations demand it.

Council members and staff credited community members and legal staff with helping the city mount a response to the proposed facility. "I want to thank Gary and Nancy for hiring an expert in oil and gas, for hiring a lawyer, for going out and finding what our case would be," one council member said during the meeting.

The ordinance language was modeled from a review of other Texas cities' approaches and was presented to the council as a first comprehensive local code to regulate sites, facilities and structures related to oil-and-gas operations in the absence of a City zoning ordinance. Staff said variances would be narrowly limited; for example, a variance could not put a facility closer than 2,000 feet to an inhabited structure.

The council approved rescission of the permits and the stop-work order by voice vote; members present voted in favor. The council later adopted the new oil-and-gas ordinance by a separate voice vote.

City staff said the long-term disposition of materials left at the former site remains unresolved and will be addressed in future discussions. Officials also said they expect to continue conversations with pipeline companies that seek to site facilities in or near Conroe.

The actions follow an extended public-comment period and months of local opposition to the originally proposed compressor-station location. Residents, neighborhood organizations and business owners had urged the council to block the site over public-safety and property-value concerns.