Continuing Chesapeake’s commitment to be a good neighbor and build stronger relationships, the company hosted back-to-back meetings to meet with members of the community in the Marcellus and Haynesville last week.
In the Marcellus at our offices in Sayre, Pennsylvania, we hosted our annual community stakeholder luncheon “meet and greet” with teams from both the corporate office and field present. The event brought in more than 50 attendees, including royalty owners, community leaders, elected officials and state agency representatives.
CEO Nick Dell’Osso and operations leaders provided a company overview and shared more about the state of the industry as well as the investment we are making in the local community.
“The attendees were extremely appreciative, engaged and voiced their interest in doing their part to help us achieve our mission and purpose of solving the global energy crisis that we see today,” said Marcellus Land Manger Julie Woodard. “They really appreciated our leadership team taking time again this year to spend several hours visiting about the issues that impact them and their communities.”
Attendees also took the opportunity to ask questions and talk about what’s on their minds, which included anticipated company activity and the status of proposed infrastructure projects in the Northeast to aid in providing additional takeaway capacity to other markets.
Celebration in the Haynesville
The Haynesville meeting took a different approach with the team hosting a more informal, celebratory event that featured lunch from local food trucks, music and the opportunity to sit down with company leaders.
“It was a great event with a lot of energy and enthusiasm for Chesapeake and the future of natural gas in the Haynesville region. We had over 200 people in attendance, including employees and community partners. Attendees enjoyed great food and music, and they really appreciated getting to meet with Nick,” said Community Affairs Representative Michelle Cavanaugh.
Also, in the Haynesville, we hosted a town hall meeting, inviting all members of the community to learn more about the development of a drilling site planned for the area.
More than 60 people attended to hear from the company and got to have one-on-one sessions with Chesapeake experts who helped address questions ranging from noise mitigation to security to truck traffic procedures.
“It couldn’t have gone any better, and the people we met with said they appreciated the opportunity to learn about the new site,” said Communications and Community Affairs Manager Brooke Coe. “We know that in-person meetings are valuable, and this reinforced how important it is and how valuable transparency is.”
Reinforcing Our Commitment
These events are a result of a formalized approach started in 2022 to begin hosting a series of in-person meetings in the areas where we operate with the goal of transparently communicating company operations, sharing our commitment to the community and offering direct access to the company.
Following the success of these efforts, the meetings are now hosted annually in various formats.
“We did have interactions and meetings with the community in the past, but we decided to make it a more concerted effort to strengthen our relationships and educate where we can,” Brooke said.
In addition to the positive feedback from the community for holding these meetings, Chesapeake received praise for its work to improve communication with royalty owners. Pennsylvania State Representative Tina Pickett acknowledged the progress to company leaders at the Marcellus meeting. She also recognized the positive impact we’re making on the community through the jobs we provide.
“Engaging in frequent, open and transparent communications with our external stakeholders is critical to the strength of our partnerships with those who live and work in the communities that we operate in. Building connections with them through these engagement opportunities makes them feel heard and is valuable to our business,” Julie said.
