CHARLESTON — An intense, five-month project finally produced a Marcellus shale regulatory bill Wednesday, disparaged by one select committee member as “anti-business” but defended by another as “a pretty good balance.”

An industry leader agreed with Sen. Karen Facemyer, R-Jackson, that the proposal advanced by the select committee would impede industry with unneeded delays.

An environmental leader questioned some of its contents as well.

Before wrapping up an exhaustive study that began back in July, the select committee agreed to send a letter to Senate President Jeffrey Kessler, D-Marshall, and House Speaker Rick Thompson, D-Wayne, asking they work with Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin on putting the measure to a special session.

Tomblin has pledged to call lawmakers into special session if a consensus is reached on regulating the fledgling industry, hailed by many as a potential bonanza for West Virginia’s economy.

Delegate Barbara Fleischauer, D-Monongalia, suggested the timing is critical, and that consideration of the proposal  shouldn’t be put off until the regular session, which opens in January.

Any bill passed then and made effective next July would mean another year’s delay in hiring more inspectors, whose ranks already are stretched too thin, she said.

One provision hikes permit fees to $10,000 for the initial well, and $5,000 for additional ones on the pod, with money going toward hiring more inspectors and retiring a debt in the Department of Environmental Protection.

“This is critical issue to our state for all kinds of reasons,” Fleischauer said.

“We have been blessed with natural resources. The price of gas is very low right now. The gas is not going to go away. We have quite a bit of activity going on in the northern part of the state.”

Facemyer was the lone lawmaker on the 10-member panel to vote against sending the bill to the Joint Committee on Government and Finance, which set up the special team to work on the bill.

“I think we’re still sending a very anti-business sentiment out there with some of the provisions of this bill,” she said.

Facemyer told fellow panelists West Virginia suffers a lack of drilling rigs, since they are being pulled out and sent to Ohio to explore for oil.

Given the fee structure and severance taxes, she said, by the time the rigs return to West Virginia, “there might not be a market for this and we’ve lost totally.”

“We need to take the time to make sure we do this right,” Facemyer said. “I’m not sure this committee as a whole ... came to real good conclusions on this.”

Fleischauer disagreed with her and urged approval by the full Legislature as soon as possible.

“We only have 15 inspectors in the field,” the delegate said.

“We have thousands of wells. We’ve had a couple of hundred permits for this new, dramatically bigger form of drilling issued every year since 2008.”

What’s more, she said, with the ever-growing activity, people are concerned about the potential for harm and abuses.

“One of the ways you allay those concerns is that you have staff that are available,” the delegate said.

“And 15 people is just not enough to cover 55 counties.”

Fleischauer said the panel sought to forge a bipartisan package that addresses problems with roads, water and air.

“We achieved a pretty good balance,” she said.

“If there turns out to be a problem, we can look at matters again. Industry said, ‘We want reasonable regulations.’ I think these are reasonable regulations.”

Doug Malcolm, chairman of government relations for the Independent Oil and Gas Association of West Virginia, sided with Facemyer’s take on the overall bill.

“We are disappointed with the outcome,” he said.

“I’ve always said we support responsible, reasonable legislation. I don’t think this really fits that description. Karen Facemyer is exactly right — it does send an anti-business message to the state, and that’s not what we need right now with Marcellus development.”

Malcolm said the bill would spawn delays in getting Marcellus operations up and running.

“I think that’s a lot of what this legislation does — it introduces a chance for delay in permitting and the development,” he added.

Julie Archer, a spokesperson for the West Virginia Surface Owners Rights Organization, a major stakeholder in the issue, said some provisions are good but other parts were “only halfway measures.”

“It concerns us that the governor is saying he’s going to be trying to get industry concerns addressed in the bill,” she said.

“And if the bill is only addressing concerns of industry, it’s not going to be a good bill for the citizens and the environment.”

A major concern for landowners is the buffer zone, set at 625 feet. Surface owners wanted at least 1,000 feet.

Moreover, Archer said a study should be performed at each site to decide if the lights, air and noise pose a problem for those living on the land.

If not, she said, in some instances, the zone could be abbreviated, since one size doesn’t fit all.

“One of the concerns we have is about the water protection provision,” she said.

The presumption of liability would extend up to 2,500 feet away, but that would be in force only six months after an operation shuts down, she pointed out.

“It could take years, even decades if a plume of contamination enters an aquifer for it to migrate past an individual well,” Archer said.

“We just don’t feel that type of limitation is positive. We’re not comfortable with that.”

— E-mail: mannix@register-herald.com