Tom lived with his boss near the mining town, and his boss’s wife mentioned she heard an oil boom was happening in Williston, North Dakota. Companies needed people to build houses for oil workers. Tom didn’t know how to use a computer, so she showed him a couple of articles about it. That was all the evidence he needed.
Tom threw his few belongings, including his stray cat, Miracle, in the back of the pickup he’d purchased for $1,000. He bought a road atlas and gathered up the $300 he’d saved. He knew he needed every penny for gas and food to make it over 1,000 miles to North Dakota.
26. DONNY NELSON
It wasn’t easy to find Donny Nelson. When I first arrived in the area, I wanted to find someone who was outspoken against the oil and gas companies, but when I asked people who that might be, I received blank stares. Having grown up in the mountains of northern California, where a new water bottling company in town prompted protests and angry letters, and our elementary school curriculum involved pretending to be trees and singing about recycling, I was shocked. “Are you sure you haven’t heard of anyone?” I asked. Finally, I called blogger Jim Fuglie, who wrote about environmental concerns in the state. Without hesitating, he blurted out Nelson’s name. “He’s your guy.”
As I soon discovered, having an opposing opinion is difficult in a pro-drill state. I expected to see frequent protests against fracking and arrived early to my first city council meeting in Williston, thinking there might be hundreds of angry locals crammed into the small room. But what I found was much different. I followed Nelson to a local county commissioners’ meeting in Watford City. Standing behind a group of developers and builders presenting their cases to receive permits (which seemed like a courtesy, as not a single one went unapproved) were three farmers, there to express their anger and concerns with the development—an elderly man with white hair who spoke in stuttered sentences, Nelson, and Nelson’s 39-year-old nephew, Troy.
Donny Nelson was considered a troublemaker, according to most North Dakotans—though he was the kindest, most softest-spoken troublemaker I’d ever met. Nelson spoke out publicly against the lack of regulation over the oil companies. He wrote op-eds about the dangerous trains transporting Bakken oil throughout the country and became the oil and gas chair for the pro-environment advocacy group, the Western Organization of Resource Councils. The local chapter, the Dakota Resource Council, called itself “the watchdogs of the prairie.” When he was in his mid-20s, Nelson participated in protests at the Canadian border to support farmers’ rights, and in 2010, he attended an anti-fracking rally in Washington, DC, where he met Gasland director Josh Fox. Nelson didn’t raise genetically modified crops on principle. Nelson wouldn’t call himself an “environmentalist,” though. He and other farmers who agreed with him called themselves “conservationists,” because they wanted to conserve the environment. There was a difference, they told me.
In some ways, Nelson was not atypical of North Dakota farmers—he struggled with wanting to conserve and protect the land around him while reckoning with his conservative upbringing that championed the free market. In an overwhelmingly Republican state, Nelson voted Independent in the 2012 presidential election because he didn’t like either candidate (“I don’t even remember who the Independent was,” he said, laughing), voted for a Democrat in the 2008 race for governor, then voted for Republican Jack Dalrymple in the 2012 governor race.
Dalrymple had taken the post in 2010 after Governor John Hoeven resigned to become a senator, and he was thrilled to inherit an oil boom. He successfully ran for reelection two years later. Though Nelson voted for Dalrymple, he regretted that decision after the governor seemed to favor the oil companies over the farmers. “He was enamored by the amount of money coming in, and I think there was some funny business going on,” said Nelson.
ExxonMobil, Continental, and Marathon Oil all contributed to Dalrymple’s campaign, and in total, he collected about $550,000 from oil-related groups. These types of contributions are not uncommon for elected officials in oil-producing states, but North Dakota was unique in that Dalrymple was also the chairman of the Industrial Commission, which was responsible for promoting and regulating the industry, creating many potential conflicts of interest. In addition, Dalrymple and his wife owned oil stock in ExxonMobil, which frequently did business with the Industrial Commission.
Other government agencies in North Dakota didn’t provide many checks and balances. The state’s Department of Mineral Resources, headed by Lynn Helms, tended to approve the Industrial Commission policies. According to a New York Times review of Industrial Commission meeting minutes from 2011 to 2014, there were zero failed motions related to oil and gas. Helms also worked for Hess and Texaco for years before joining the North Dakota Department of Mineral Resources. Nelson heard Helms call the people impacted by oil development “collateral damage.”
“I’ve heard people from both sides of the aisle say they’ve never seen a more arrogant, disrespectful legislature than this one here in North Dakota,” said Nelson. “They belittle people and don’t listen to ’em. We’ve filled the room before trying to get something passed, and they’ve just ignored us.”
State agencies are supposed to fine companies for spills and other violations, for example, but in a three-year span, regulators issued fewer than 50 disciplinary fines for all drilling violations, including thousands of spills. And many times, the fines were later dismissed or reduced significantly. The Department of Mineral Resources increased its staff by 30 percent but still had only 19 inspectors in 2012, fewer than other oil states; Oklahoma, for example, had 58. The Environmental Protection Agency wasn’t much help. The agency investigated spill complaints only on federal lands; it referred any incident on private property to the state regulators. Helms himself admitted that while the EPA technically oversaw their underground injection of fracking wastewater, its presence was limited: “The EPA has oversight over our program, but the last time an EPA person came to Bismarck, North Dakota, and checked our records was in September of 2001,” he said in 2011.
When I asked Nelson why more people didn’t fight back and protest, he shook his head. That’s not the North Dakota way, he explained. “They call it ‘North Dakota nice.’ If you disagree, maybe you walk away and do it your own way, but you don’t cause waves.” The slow way of life in the plains didn’t foster much urgency to create change. “The farmers and ranchers of western North Dakota can wait years for rain,” wrote Kathleen Norris back in 1993. “Time is defined not by human agency but by the natural rhythms of day and night, and of the seasons.” Among a peer group of stoic noncomplainers, Nelson stood out. “People come to me because I tell the bad side,” he said.
In 2013, Nelson began fighting a legal process called unitization. Companies typically broke up drilling areas into 1,280-acre parcels, but unitization combined those parcels into a mega-unit of 30,000 to 40,000 acres in an attempt to increase profits for everyone when a well aged and less oil (and thus money) flowed. Unitization was promoted in the early 1990s when North Dakota’s oil production had plummeted. During that time, the state legislature lowered the percentage of mineral owners required to form a unit. In theory, the law was supposed to help the company and the landowner. The company cut costs, and landowners still received profits because they’d be part of a larger parcel with more wells, though the revenue would be divided up between more families. The downside was that once you agreed to unitization, companies could create a new lease on their own terms, potentially giving them more power.
Nelson saw the reality of what happened under unitization in 2012. The Industrial Commission approved a deal to combine smaller units into a 30,000-acre mega-unit near Corral Creek, not far from Nelson’s property. Many landowners within the mega-unit had no say in the deal because only the owners of 60 percent of the unit’s mineral owners were needed for approval, and the state government owned many of the mineral acres within the unit. Nelson’s neighbor, who was involved in the deal, lost his original lease
and 70 percent of his monthly royalty payments. ConocoPhillips, which had purchased 50 percent of the mineral acres in the new unit, argued that unitization would allow the company to protect more land and drill fewer wells, reportedly telling landowners it planned to drill only 83 wells in the entire spacing unit. But after the deal was approved, ConocoPhillips revised that number to 200 wells. Nelson worried that the company would do the same with his land. “They’d basically be able to do whatever they want,” he said.
A 30,000-acre plot is about twice the size of Manhattan. I decided to climb up Thunder Butte on a clear, sunny afternoon to get a better idea of how much land could be in jeopardy. There was no trail to the summit, so I pushed past sagebrush, reeds, and prairie grass to get there.
The butte has been a sacred landmark for Native Americans for hundreds of years. When I reached the flat top, there was a single tree branch in the center with faded red fabric tied around it, almost like a flag. It was the only remnant of the tribal ceremonies that once took place here. Nelson and his brother used to climb to the top as small children and carved their names next to hundreds of others, some dating back to the 1800s.
I could see in every direction, and I spotted Nelson’s house. I also counted at least 15 oil wells, two of which were directly below the butte, as well as about a dozen more holding tanks storing either oil or brine and a large waste pit to the east. The number of wells here would likely double or triple within a year—almost as if the oil wells were soldiers slowly invading, and, once again, those living off the land were caught in the crossfire. The days when this land was remote and sacred seemed like a long time ago.
I scrambled down some rocks and saw the carvings, though I couldn’t find Nelson’s or his brother’s name. I started to head back down, but when I reached the edge, the path looked much steeper than I remembered. I walked to the opposite side of the butte and the land dropped off to a sheer rock face. I suddenly felt an overwhelming fear of heights. After a brief panic, I decided to return the way I came, sliding down on my rear the entire way and inching through the tall grass. Only later did Nelson tell me the grass was crawling with rattlesnakes.
The next day, Nelson and I drove along a highway that followed the Missouri River to one of his durum fields a few miles away. A few years ago, on this same highway, he used to ride his motorcycle and not meet another vehicle for miles. “This used to be the most scenic drive in the U.S., and now it’s all oil wells,” he told me. Today, with 50,000-pound semis continuously roaring by at 70 miles an hour, it had become too dangerous to take his motorcycle out. “[The area] is full of natural springs, but now I don’t even recognize it,” he said. All drivers could see now were oil wells and their flares, burning off natural gas, 24 hours a day. Waste disposal tanks speckled the landscape. The tanks were frequent targets for lightning strikes and easily caught fire. It wasn’t uncommon to see black smoke billowing up into the open sky on clear days. “It will never be the same in my lifetime,” said Nelson.
27. CINDY MARCHELLO
Ultimately, it was Richard who asked for a divorce. In 2006, they were living in an old, 12-bedroom, 8,000-square-foot former boarding house that they purchased in Cornish, Utah, a tiny town close to the Idaho border. Cindy had created a mildly successful acupuncture business for herself 40 minutes away in Logan, making about $2,500 a month, but lately it hadn’t been doing so well. Gas prices were high, the local economy was struggling, and business was slowing down.
The kids had moved out a few years earlier. Elizabeth had turned 18 and rented a house with roommates, and Jennie had decided to live with her brother Ricky, who had moved into his own apartment. As they described it, Richard quickly fell into a downward spiral after the kids were gone.
Cindy was gone often—at acupuncture conferences, working as a cook for a hunting camp in the summers, hiking the Pacific Crest Trail—and Richard was left to himself a lot. They had long been sleeping in separate bedrooms, and they did their best to avoid each other. “He’d be alone in the big house and it just made him go crazy,” said Elizabeth, their older daughter. He began taking money out of Cindy’s acupuncture business account, stopped hiding his affairs with other women, and the house deteriorated. He had remodeling projects all over the house—he’d want to redo the floors so he’d scrape off all the paint, then abandon the work and move on to something else. He’d bring in junk, such as saddles and car engines and hundreds of milk jugs from a garage sale, and leave them all in the living room.
At one point, he wanted to cut out the floor of one room and build a trout pond. “That’s crazy, Dad!” Elizabeth remembered telling him. He wouldn’t listen to her, or anyone else, but fortunately he moved on to another project before he sawed away any floorboards.
One time, before Cindy departed for a long trip, she cleaned the house thoroughly and gave Richard instructions on what needed to be done while she was away. But when she returned, none of the bills had been paid, so there was no power and no phone connection. Mice had gnawed into everything, and piles of dishes were all over the kitchen. She had to borrow money from her father to keep her car from being repossessed.
Richard and Cindy sought counseling at their Mormon church to work on their marriage but didn’t make much progress. To Cindy, it seemed like the church simply wanted her to be a better wife, and their marriage would be fixed. Richard was charming, and it was hard for anyone in the church to believe he would do anything to contribute to their unhappiness. They also didn’t know about his past. Cindy lost many friends in the church during this time. “I think a lot of people were uncomfortable,” said Elizabeth. “What do you say to someone whose life is falling apart? In most religions, you hide problems in a marriage. If the bishop’s coming over, you make sure there are pictures of Christ in the front room and laugh when the kids misbehave, because company’s over. That’s how my parents were. You couldn’t see the mess they left behind closed doors.”
One morning, as Cindy prepped to travel to California for another acupuncture conference, she and Richard started arguing about money. In the heat of the argument, she said to him, “So, are you just done with me?” What she meant was, should she leave the room so they could have some space? But Richard took it a different way. As Cindy remembered it, he replied, “Yeah, I’m done with you. Take the dog and your canning jars and get out.” Their dog at the time was a Doberman and Rottweiler mix named Zeus. She left to go to the conference that day, hoping maybe Richard hadn’t meant it. But when she came back, he confirmed he wanted a divorce. She moved out soon after.
“She was really, really sad when she and my dad finally split up, even though it was 20 years of splitting up in the making,” said their younger daughter, Jennie. Elizabeth agreed. “She didn’t want the divorce. At all. Even though he was unbearable. It just wasn’t in her to divorce. When she makes a commitment, she follows through.”
At first, Cindy stayed with her son Ricky in his basement apartment, but the space was cramped. She reached out to the church to see if they could help her find her own apartment since she had no rental history, but when the bishop found out she was divorcing, he told her he couldn’t do anything. Cindy was devoted to the church, and this stung, especially since the church helped Richard pay his utility bills. “If they’d helped me, I wouldn’t be in North Dakota right now,” she said.
Cindy moved around a lot during this period. She slept on the couches of friends and family, but much of the time her kids didn’t know where she was. She lived in a trailer for a while in Logan, Utah, then found a dingy, two-bedroom apartment in a rough neighborhood for $500 a month. Some floorboards were missing in the bathroom, but the landlord didn’t care about Cindy’s rental history.
Richard moved out of the Cornish house and had stopped making the payments. The mortgage was now under water—the amount they owed was higher than the value of the home. Though Cindy would’ve liked to keep the house, she couldn’t afford the payments on her own. In 2008, they lost the house to for
eclosure, along with millions of other Americans who were hit by the housing crisis. Before the bank repossessed it, Jennie went and grabbed all the photo albums she could find. “It was in an awful, awful state. It was just rubble, just destroyed,” she said. Richard liked to hunt and had left a deer’s headless carcass strung up and bleeding onto the bathroom floor.
Around the same time, Cindy’s acupuncture business collapsed, and she was forced to file for bankruptcy. Afterward, she took any job she could find. She worked weekends at a cell phone billing company, sorting and processing mail, and worked the swing shift during the week at a circuit board factory, both for $8 an hour. But she wasn’t making ends meet. She paid around $400 a month to the court for her bankruptcy, a payment she would have to make for about three years, and many times she only had $200 or $300 left over to live on for the month. She also hated the jobs. She hated having a supervisor stand over her, watching her constantly. If she clocked in two minutes late, she’d get in trouble. She hardly had time to take bathroom breaks. At 50 years old, this was not how she had pictured her life.
One day she logged onto the computer and Googled “what job makes money?” The oil field came up in her search, and she saw open positions in Rock Springs, Wyoming. Most of the jobs didn’t require a college degree, but a commercial driver’s license or heavy-duty diesel mechanic certification was recommended. She thought, I can do that. They both cost around $2,500—she didn’t have the money up front, but the diesel mechanic certification offered a monthly payment plan.
While in school, she began living out of her 2001 Ford Taurus to save money. She would leave the billing center job at 3 a.m. and head to the college parking lot where she’d sleep for a few hours. Class started at 7:30 a.m., so just before class, she’d clean up in the school restroom to look presentable. After class, she’d go to Elizabeth’s house for lunch, then head to her next job at the circuit board factory, then do it all over again. “I didn’t really sleep then,” she said. “Nobody realized I was living in my car.”
The New Wild West Page 18