A privately held oil company with an interest in limiting public input on its requests to change New Mexico’s drilling rules faces opposition from local environmentalists who learned about the company’s latest proposal from notices published in their local papers.

Texas-based Hilcorp Energy Co. is petitioning the New Mexico Oil Conservation Commission (OCC) to allow it to double the number of wells it operates in San Juan and Rio Arriba counties. Local activist Mike Eisenfeld learned about the proposal when he read a public notice in the Farmington Daily Times in late August, according to NMPolitics.net. The notice also ran in the Rio Grande Sun on the Friday before Labor Day, and “opponents were left scrambling to organize and formally object to the move within a seven-day deadline,” San Juan County cattle farmer Don Schreiber told the Sante Fe New Mexican.