Spotted at the Climate Summit: Republican Mayors

After Greg Lemons was elected mayor of Abita Springs, Louisiana, in 2012, residents of the 2,500-person city started coming to him to complain about a local landowner’s plan to lease about 60,000 acres to Helis Oil & Gas for hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking. Although area voters supported Donald Trump in the 2016 election, they were concerned that the company’s plans to drill through the aquifer the town relies on—the former spa town sells Abita-branded spring water and beer—could compromise its economic livelihood.

Lemons, a lifelong Republican who spent his career in the banking technology industry, initially felt the deal would be positive for the town, but he decided to investigate anyway. “I’m an engineer by trade, so I said, ‘I need to do a little research on this,’” he recalled. “I read everything I could online.” He started traveling to other fracking sites to learn more. The resulting three-year journey led him through western Pennsylvania, central Texas, and northern Louisiana.