TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) – A proposed pipeline that would bring oil from Canada into the U.S. was criticized as environmentally dangerous by people in Kansas and praised in Texas as a safe way to create much needed jobs nationwide.

About 200 people attended a meeting Monday in Topeka, Kan., with many environmentalists speaking against the $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline. More than 500 packed a meeting in Port Arthur, Texas.

Rabbi Moti Rieber, coordinator of Kansas Interfaith Power & Light, said the pipeline represents “a new dependence on an even dirtier environmentally devastating form of energy.”

Kansas Republican Gov. Sam Brownback says he supports the pipeline because it would boost national security by giving the U.S. a steady source of oil from a “friendly nation that’s next door.”

Labor union members support the pipeline because of the jobs it would create.