Groups protest 'forced pooling' in proposed gas tax
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HARRISBURG -- Some citizens groups today demanded that the Legislature not approve a provision called "forced pooling'' as part of any bill to impose a new tax on natural gas pumped from Marcellus shale.
Activist Gene Stilp denounced such an idea, calling it "subterranean eminent domain,'' and contending it would allow gas companies to drill under a landowner's property even if the owner didn't want to lease his land for gas exploration.
Such a holdout's land could, against his wishes, be "pooled'' together with neighboring properties, whose owners had agreed to let drilling go on under their land, Mr. Stilp and several property owners from Luzerne and Lackawanna counties complained.
Mr. Stilp didn't take a position on whether the Legislature should enact a new shale tax by its self-imposed target date of Oct. 1. But he and the others said that legislators should not approved forced pooling as a concession to the drilling industry in exchange for having it go along with a shale tax.
The protestors also urged legislators not to include in any shale tax bill a second provision, which would allow the state to override local municipal zoning ordinances that now prevent industrial drilling operations from going on near residential areas, schools or parks.
"A natural gas severance tax should not be linked in any way to forced pooling or exceptions to municipal zoning,'' said Duke Barrett, a property owner in Dallas, Luzerne County, and a member of the Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition. "The industry wants forced pooling so they can get access to prime land they couldn't get because an owner refuses to sign a lease.''
Leslie Avakian, a Lackawanna County property owner, said, "The Legislature should not give away our private property rights or municipal rights on zoning.''
Travis Windle, a spokesman for the Marcellus Shale Coalition, which represents gas drillers, objected to the term "forced pooling.'' He said a better term is "fair pooling.''
In a recent Op-Ed article, coalition President Kathryn Klaber said a fair pooling statute "is on the books of almost every energy-producing state in the country except Pennsylvania.'' She said such a law works well in other states and "brings efficiency to natural gas development and helps reduce surface disturbances.''
She said that Reps. Marc Gergely, D-White Oak, and Garth Everett, R-Lycoming, "recognize that fair pooling provides economic and environmental benefits to Pennsylvanians'' and have drafted a Conservation Pooling Act for the Legislature to consider.
First Published September 14, 2010 12:33 pm
