Andrew Cuomo said today: "Literally on a weekly basis, you can get academics and reports saying it's totally safe and then the next week you get a report saying it's the most dangerous thing since a nuclear explosion," Cuomo said. "You know, that's one of the challenges. It's become a very highly politicized, highly emotional, highly opinionated topic and I am relying on substantive experts in my administration who don't bring any bias to work through it and give me their best advice, which I will follow. I'm not a scientist. I'm not going through the data and the research myself, but they are."

Hawkins had the following response to Cuomo's comments:

"Today, Andrew Cuomo got one thing right: he's not a scientist. Unfortunately, his own Administration recklessly edited a federal US Geological Survey study, literally removing parts of it that showed the problems and threats of fracking to New Yorkers. Then the Governor says that he is relying on those same "experts" in his Administration not to bring any bias. I've got news for Cuomo, New Yorkers aren't buying it. And New Yorkers aren't buying the notion that oil and gas industry-sponsored studies that say fracking is safe are legitimate. Their "frackademics" are bought and paid for to tout the industry as opposed to the real unbiased scientists who week after week are finding inherent problems with fracking that cannot be prevented."

"We have well failures and leakage of contaminants into water. In any human endeavor, there will be mistakes – a percentage of well casing will fail and there will be contamination. Even if wells do not leak, they are releasing carbon and methane gas into the atmosphere, and contributing to global warming and the climate crisis."

See the recent compilation of scientific studies on fracking from Concerned Health Professionals of New York at http://concernedhealthny.org/compendium/