WV and PA Governors’ Independent Moves to Further Gas Drilling

by Nicole Good on January 18, 2012

As promised by his recent campaign, West Virginia governor Earl Ray Tomblin proposed more jobs and lower taxes to the legislature today.  Apparently the 5 year break on property taxes approved by the legislature last year was not good enough– the governor proposes a 25 year break from property taxes for any company that will invest $2 billion or more in an ethane cracker plant.  The trade-off for the thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in wages, of course, is revenue for public school systems.  Read the full article in the Charleston Daily Mail…

Pennsylvania’s Governor Tom Corbett recently broke down barriers to drilling in state forests by terminating the executive director of the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Citizens Advisory Council.  Kurt Leitholf had held the position since 1996.  He was fired last week, two days after he was notified that his position had been eliminated.  The Council feels that his firing was illegal, and notes that it comes at a time when citizens most need a venue for expressing public input.  Despite the hundreds of millions of dollars Pennsylvania has reaped from leasing state lands already, the DCNR had their budget slashed by 30% last year.  More state forest lands are under consideration of being opened to gas drilling.  Read the full article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette…

Leave a Comment

Previous post:

Next post: