The Register-Herald, Beckley, West Virginia

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December 13, 2011

Citizen group leader says Tomblin ‘hijacked’ bill

By Mannix Porterfield Register-Herald Reporter

CHARLESTON — Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin turned a Marcellus shale regulatory bill into “a Christmas tree” for the gas industry, making it so feeble that it should be delayed until the 2012 session, a citizen leader charged Monday.

Gary Zuckett, director of West Virginia-Citizen Action Group, said the legislation sent to lawmakers by Tomblin at the start of this special session is fraught with too many problems to be corrected in one week.

“We think we should wait, go to the regular session, and just do it right, because this whole process has gotten hijacked,” Zuckett told The Register-Herald.

Zuckett and the West Virginia Surface Owners’ Rights Organization said lawmakers should end the special session that officially opened Sunday night and delay any action on the Marcellus bill until January.

“This whole process has been hijacked by closed-door meetings after much work by the select committee this summer,” Zuckett said.

Over the summer interims schedule, he said, citizen groups coaxed some concessions in the original bill regulating the Marcellus industry to protect farmers, sources of water and landowners.

“However, what we have before us now is a Christmas tree for the drillers,” Zuckett said.

“We cannot support the governor’s Christmas tree for the industry. We cannot support his industry bill.”

In its objections, the Surface Owners’ Rights Organization denounced the bill on several points.

One is that Tomblin’s version only applies to horizontal wells and doesn’t cover vertical ones that disturb between 3 and 5 acres and consume 1 million gallons of water.

Another dispute lies in the buffer zone of 625 feet, which SORO says will make it impossible for landowners to sleep at night over the course of several months. With a variance, a driller could set up shop even closer.

SORO also is miffed that Tomblin’s version removes the required notice of permit in a newspaper, so that residents would be denied the opportunity to comment about an impending operation.

The group also charged that Tomblin’s new version weakens the existing presumption that drilling causes contamination of a water well by making it apply only to six months.

What’s more, the select committee’s bill expanded the presumption of damage from 1,000 feet to 2,500 feet, but Tomblin’s proposal places it at 1,500 feet.

SORO also said the governor’s bill makes surface owners “servient” to the “dominant” driller in horizontal drilling, despite a 1981 law that says the rights of mineral and surface owners is equal.

The group said Tomblin’s bill also erases incentives for drillers to recognize common law right and work with landowners on the location of wells and access roads.

“We think the governor has gone way overboard on the side of industry on this,” Zuckett said.

“Everybody wants the jobs. Everybody wants the revenues from the Marcellus, but we need to do it right. We don’t want to make the same mistakes we made with the coal industry.”

— E-mail: mannix@register-herald.com

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