Last week there were full-page advertisements for Canadian tar sands that showed up in our local papers. These ads are insulting to the intelligence of the people of South Portland, and something smells very rotten. That smell is unadulterated corporate greed.

Don’t be fooled, the group “Energy Citizens” is a corporate front for the oil industry. No matter what the consequences they are hell bent on using that old Portland Pipe Line pipe to ship tar sands out of South Portland for export to other countries, not for us to use here in Maine.

South Portland would take all of the risk of tar sands in our city and none of the benefit.

We don’t want South Portland to become a tar-sands export terminal of the Northeast. We don’t want our beautiful city, our air and water to be contaminated while the oil industry rakes in huge profits.

Please continue to urge our City Council to have an ordinance written to stop tar sands before it comes through the old pipe to South Portland. The truth is we have to look out for our city and each other in this.

Rachel Burger

South Portland