ATHOL — An Athol woman who opposes the controversial Dakota Access pipeline has arranged to send a truckload of straw to the camp of protesters planning to settle in for a brutal North Dakota winter.
Hattie Nestel recently organized a shipment of 237 bales to the protester’s camp, which is expected to be used as insulation in the structures that they’re building.
The 1,172-mile, 30-inch diameter pipeline that would connect the rapidly expanding Bakken and Three Forks oil production areas in North Dakota to Patoka, Ill., has become a hotbed of national anti-pipeline activism, with an expanding protest encampment led by the Standing Rock Sioux that’s attracted thousands from across the country digging in to prevent it from crossing the reservation and damaging water resources. The situation has led to several clashes between protesters and law enforcement.
“I have a friend out there, and he said they desperately need straw bales for insulation,” Nestel said of her effort. She said straw is scarce at the site of the protests because of law enforcement road blocks and hesitancy among some straw producers to deliver there. “So, I filled a 26-foot truck with straw bales from Flagg Farm in Gill. It all came together within 24 hours.”
Nestel said she got the idea during a recent walk from Plymouth to Mashpee. She mentioned the idea, and one of the participants offered to pay for it, while another offered to drive it out.
The shipment arrived last week after a 27-hour drive. The truck was driven alternately by Tim Bullock of the Leverett Peace Pagoda and Hardwick resident Brayton Shanley of the Agape Community. A third passenger, who Nestel said was a blind woman, was dropped off to join the protests.
Nestel said she’s been working to defend native American rights, expand social justice and combat climate change and environmental injustice for decades. For her, the fight against the Dakota Access pipeline represents aspects of all those causes.
“This is a real justice issue,” she said. “I’m against fossil fuels, period, and these kind of justice issues are just ingrained in my genes to come out swinging.”
Nestel said she also plans to organize weekly protests against TD Bank, an investor in the project, to try to persuade people to boycott the bank until it divests from the pipeline. She also hopes to speak with U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren about the issue.
“I don’t stop,” she said of her activism.
You can reach Tom Relihan at: 413-772-0261, ext. 264
or trelihan@recorder.com On Twitter, @RecorderTom