Scarnati Pours Cold Water on Corbett’s Commission

Scott Detrow / StateIm­pact Pennsylvania

Joe Scar­nati talks to reporters at last Friday’s press conference.

Gov­er­nor Tom Corbett’s Mar­cel­lus Shale Advi­sory Com­mis­sion issues its report tomor­row, but Sen­ate Pres­i­dent Pro Tem Joe Scar­nati isn’t exactly wait­ing for it with bated breath. “I can’t say I’ll read the report on Sat­ur­day,” he told reporters at the Capi­tol Thurs­day after­noon, “but I may start read­ing it on Sunday.”

You’d think Scar­nati would be excited about a report that endorses his pet issue, an impact fee on nat­ural gas drillers. But the top Sen­ate Repub­li­can appeared frus­trated and ambiva­lent when dis­cussing the commission’s impend­ing report. His com­ments are the most out­ward signs to-date the 30-member panel’s rec­om­men­da­tions won’t exactly take the Gen­eral Assem­bly by storm, once they’re public.

“I’m not a com­mis­sion advo­cate,” Scar­nati said, when asked whether he wished law­mak­ers had been given more input dur­ing the delib­er­a­tive process. “Some of the peo­ple [on the com­mis­sion] were fine peo­ple. I don’t dis­pute their qual­i­fi­ca­tions or intent. But the bot­tom line is, I’m going to vote on the bill and would have liked to have input on what [was in the report.]”

“It’s nice we have a report,” he con­tin­ued, “But we still need to have leg­isla­tive inter­ac­tion. And what [the com­mis­sion has] done is it’s delayed that. We’ve delayed leg­isla­tive action.” The Repub­li­can had lob­bied hard to pass an impact fee along­side the bud­get last month, and admit­ted he was frus­trated law­mak­ers left town with­out one. Cor­bett effec­tively stopped the impact fee push in its tracks in late June, when he vowed to threaten any mea­sure that reached his desk before the com­mis­sion report.

Still, Scar­nati and a grow­ing num­ber of law­mak­ers from both par­ties want to pass an impact fee. And if the com­mis­sion shapes what Cor­bett will and won’t accept in a bill, its input mat­ters. While Cor­bett has remained vague on what he’d like to see in an impact fee, many of his advi­sors have expressed hes­i­tance over any for­mula direct­ing money back to Har­ris­burg. Statewide envi­ron­men­tal efforts would be funded by Scarnati’s mea­sure, but he hinted he’d be open to remov­ing them, if that’s what it takes to pass a fee.   “I tried to work within [Corbett’s] para­me­ters when I intro­duced Sen­ate Bill 1100,” he said. “My goal is to get a bill through the leg­is­la­ture. …I don’t want to go through smoke and mir­rors. I want to get a bill to the gov­er­nor that he can sign.”

Scott Detrow / StateImpactPA

Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Jim Caw­ley and Energy Exec­u­tive Patrick Hen­der­son after Friday’s com­mis­sion meeting

And if Scar­nati was ambiva­lent on the commission’s impact fee rec­om­men­da­tions, he was down­right hos­tile toward  its sug­ges­tion to “revisit” the 1961 law reg­u­lat­ing “forced pool­ing” of min­eral rights, which excludes the Mar­cel­lus Shale for­ma­tion from con­di­tions where drillers can extract gas from under­neath a land owner’s prop­erty against his or her will. “I can tell you where prop­erty own­ers are” on the issue, He said. “Absolutely no pool­ing. It’s [been] very clear to me for over a year now that the issue is one that can be a deal-breaker. …If the com­mis­sion wants to rec­om­mend pool­ing they are adding a fatal flaw.”

Scar­nati still hasn’t seen the actual report. Admin­is­tra­tion offi­cials will allegedly brief leg­isla­tive lead­ers on the doc­u­ment just before it becomes pub­lic tomor­row. It’s unclear when Cor­bett will pub­li­cally react to it. His press office has not returned calls for com­ment, on when to expect a state­ment from the governor.