The state Senate’s Environmental Resources and Energy Committee is set to consider and approve the House’s impact fee today. “What’s that?” You may be wondering. “Legislative leaders have reached an agreement on how much to charge drillers, who would collect an impact fee, and other outstanding disagreements?” Not at all. Today’s vote is the latest [...]
A brief note in this morning’s Pipeline morning links adds an interesting dynamic to behind-the-scenes impact fee negotiations. The Post-Gazette’s Laura Olson covered an energy forum in Hershey yesterday, which Governor Corbett attended. She writes, “Gov. Tom Corbett declined to take questions yesterday about the discussion to craft a compromise Marcellus Shale measure, thought his [...]
As we’ve reported, the next step on the impact fee front will happen behind closed doors. There are several major differences between the measures passed by the House and Senate last week. Before either chamber holds another vote, House and Senate leaders will need to get together and work out a compromise. A key player [...]
State legislators may no longer be weighing whether or not to “supersede and preempt” local drilling regulations. But the two impact fees in front of the House and Senate would still restrict what municipalities could and could not regulate, when it comes to gas extraction operations within their boundaries. Both the House and Senate added [...]
The Senate passed a wide-ranging Marcellus Shale impact fee bill last night, two days after the chamber’s Appropriations Committee approved major changes to the measure. What’s inside the latest version of Senate President Pro Tem Joe Scarnati’s impact fee? Here’s StateImpact’s annotated version of SB 1100. We’ve highlighted sections dictating how the fee is collected [...]
And there you have it: in the span of a few hours tonight, Pennsylvania’s General Assembly made more progress on Marcellus Shale legislation than it has in the last three years combined. The Senate passed a broad bill imposing an impact fee and strengthening environmental regulations on a 29-20 vote. It’s the first time the [...]
Update: after a lengthy floor debate, the amendment passed just before 7:30 PM on a 110-85 vote. A major development in the impact fee debate is underway on the House floor. Republican Representative Matt Baker has offered an amendment eliminating HB 1950′s language “superseding and preempting” local zoning regulations. His amendment, which is backed by [...]
After years of debate on the issue, both the state House and Senate will vote on Marcellus Shale impact fee bills this week. The Senate will likely approve its measure this afternoon or evening. A House vote could come as early as Wednesday. (The chamber is debating the measure now, but has more than 100 [...]
Pennsylvania’s Senate will vote on its leadership-sponsored impact fee this afternoon or evening, but after being amended in committee last night, the legislation looks much different than the bill we’ve been covering since it was introduced in May. What’s in the new bill? A 20-year impact fee that begins at $50,000-per-well. It drops to $40,000 [...]
Today, Pennsylvania’s state Capitol is Shale Central. The Senate will likely vote on SB 1100, which the Appropriations Committee amended yesterday to create a much broader impact fee structure than Governor Corbett’s proposed ten-year formula. The Senate measure now begins at $50,000-per-well. It gradually lowers to a $10,000-a-year fee, but stays in place for twenty, [...]
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