Dear Editor – PXP Offers “Misrepresentations of Facts”

Dear Editor:

It was with great anticipation that we as Culver City citizens attended PXP’s fourth annual community meeting at the Knox Presbyterian Church this past Monday, October 15th. In the audience were members of the Culver City Council, Chamber of Commerce and officials from the Department of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) who are charged with the responsibility of drafting regulations governing the process of hydraulic fracture in California.

It became obvious to most of us who read the PXP funded study performed by Cardno ENTRIX that there were misrepresentations of fact and data throughout the entire presentation. As a physician, I was most disturbed by Dr. Dan Tormey’s statement that the LA County, Department of Public Health’s study did not show any statistical difference between residents of the Inglewood Oil Field (IOF) and the rest of LA County in terms of their health issues. The fact of the matter is that most of us community members attended the Community Advisory Panel (CAP) meeting on July 26th when the Department of Public Health (DPH) presented their data on Inglewood Oil Field Communities’ Survey. DPH told us that they did not perform any statistical analysis of their data as they did not have a big enough sample size to scrutinize their data. So, how could Dr. Tormey state there were NO statistical differences in the health of IOF residents vs. the rest of LA County residents? His answer was that it may have been in the long version of the study! The truth is that I had a copy of the study in my hands and there were no statistical analyses at all. It was evident that Dr. Tormey did not read the references that he cited in his study.

This theme was brought up again by Dr. Tom Williams who used to work for the oil industry for four decades and now is one of Sierra Club’s environmental directors. Dr. Williams cited many instances where the author, Dr. Tormey did not seem to be familiar with many of the references or had misquoted them.

The issue of misquoted and misrepresented data was a recurrent theme throughout the presentation. This, along with PXP’s assumption that the public might not read their report in their entirety is even more disturbing and sinister. I agree with Dr. Suzanne Debenedittis’ suggestion that the data be evaluated by Patricia MacPherson and Dr. Tom Williams who can provide and independent and professional assessment of PXP’s data.

Khin Khin Gyi, M.D., Ph.D.
Neurology in Beverly Hills & Culver City
President, Culver Crest Neighborhood Association