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What happens in Illinois, doesn’t stay in Illinois. That was the message last week of acclaimed scientist and author Sandra Steingraber, who joined the growing local’s to pass a moratorium on the controversial hydraulic gas drilling operations until the state could conduct a comprehensive scientific and health assessment.

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The Illinois House and Senate passed a regulatory bill last Friday, which had been brokered in a backroom deal by Illinois Democrats, gas industry and labor representatives, and a small cadre of environmental groups but—to the consternation of Steingraber and grassroot activists—without any independent scientists, health experts, or impacted downstate residents at the negotiating table.

Despite these concerns, the Chicago Tribune’s lede was “Let the fracking begin.” The Washington Post, similarly, ran with the prevailing narrative about the bill: “Illinois lawmakers approve nation’s toughest fracking regulations.”

Not so, says Steingraber, an Illinois native, who in the anti-fracking movement in New York and across the country. Testifying at a last minute House committee hearing with Gasland director Josh Fox, at the Illinois state capitol, and from the offices of Gov. Pat Quinn, Attorney General Lisa Madigan, and environmental lobbyists, Steingraber didn’t pull any punches. “We consider the fracking regulatory bill to be a subversion of both science and democracy,” she said. “No public hearings or public comment periods ever took place. And yet it is the public that is being compelled to live with the risks sanctioned by this bill. It is an unjust law.”

Filmmaker Ben Evans and I sat down with Steingraber on the eve of the vote and asked her to speak on a number of topics, including why Illinois’ historic fracking regulations should matter to the rest of the nation, and why the state is becoming another .

(Part 1 of the video is above, while parts 2 through 5 are posted below.)

Ben Evans is a documentary filmmaker, actor, and owner of . His award-winning eco-docu-comedy, “YERT: Your Environmental Road Trip,” is now available from First Run Features and at .

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