CHARLESTON — Industry is displeased with some provisions of the proposed Marcellus shale regulatory law, but if Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin bends too far in its direction, one key legislator said major changes could spark a revolt in the Legislature.

As of Thursday, the governor hadn’t made up his mind about when, or even whether, he intends to call lawmakers back to town for a session.

Smart money has been talking about a session opening Dec. 11, on the eve of the three-day interims, but Tomblin’s communications director, Jacqueline Proctor, said he hasn’t decided when to make an announcement.

“The office has been looking at the bill,” she said.

“As the governor has said, he might want to consider some tweaks to it but he’s hoping to possibly call a special session during December interims.”

Delegate Tim Manchin, D-Harrison, a co-chairman of a special, 10-member select committee that crafted the bill, defended it as reasonable and said any major concessions to industry could doom it.

“If we write this bill exactly the way industry wants, there’s no sense in having a bill,” he said.

“I think it’s a good bill. We’ve received some recommendations from industry. We’ll pass those along to counsel. A lot of them look quite reasonable to me. It’s not like this is absolutely etched in stone, but there are certain fundamental concepts, if they’re changed, then we’ve got some problems.”

One bone of contention lies in the jobs reporting provision.

Industry leaders are opposed to the requirement to provide a breakdown of jobs — in-state, out of state, and the aggregate payroll for each category.

“This is so we have some idea whether we’re really getting all those jobs,” Manchin said. “They don’t like it, and I haven’t heard a good reason, other than “nobody else has to.’”

Manchin said environmental harm is inevitable.

“Sooner or later, there’s a cumulative effect, no matter how you do it, and I understand that,” he said.

“Then you’ve got traffic. You’ve got road issues, and we’re told that we should be happy with all that because of all the jobs. Well, I just want to know how many jobs. I want accurate numbers. I don’t want to have to read some professor’s estimate based on a research grant that he got from the oil and gas industry to come up with those numbers. I want to see the actual numbers. I don’t expect those to be all West Virginians. If 80 percent are West Virginians, I’ll be tickled to death. If it’s only 20 percent, I’m not real happy.”

Then, there is another angle — are those good-paying jobs for West Virginians, or merely at the low end of the scale?

“If the Legislature needs to ramp up training for our people to get those good jobs, we need this information to figure out what we need to do,” he said.

“We can’t force them to hire West Virginians. But certainly public pressure means something. It’s a way of putting a little pressure on them to get the numbers up and make a little more effort to hire West Virginians.”

Manchin says the jobs tracking should be simple, since all W-2 forms bear the worker’s name and legal residence.

In some industry circles, some are still grousing about the well casing standards, the delegate said.

Manchin said he learned from conversations with Pennsylvania firms that there is little, if any, problems dealing with compliance, but some in the industry simply don’t want to be tied to specific rules.

“I think our people are afraid of underground water contamination,” Manchin said.

“And the word needs to get to our people that the only way they can ever see that occur is if there’s a breakdown in the casing. Our casing is conceptual. It’s not technical. We responded to the people by adopting some strict standards that require standards on the material being used and the inspection process. We’ve done everything that’s reasonably necessary to ensure that there’s not going to be any kind of contamination.”

Initially, they were placed in code, but industry wanted the standards in rules, and when the Legislature changed the plan, the Marcellus forces wanted the ability to alter the rules as technology changes, Manchin said.

“Now we went to a guidance document that really doesn’t have the full force and effect of law,” he said.

“And then that guidance document still has a provision for the Department of Environmental Protection to say that it can approve something based on it being equally protective, and now they don’t like that.”

Another key element that could prompt some angst is one on surface use agreements between landowners and the holders of mineral rights.

“I can tell you there are some delegates who felt that was an absolute, must provision,” Manchin said.

“They feel they will vote against the bill if that’s not in there. I suspect we will have a session. Whether it’s a bill people can still live with is another matter.”

— E-mail: mannix@register-herald.com