Published: July 7, 2013

Property rights supposedly are sacrosanct to the conservative Republicans who lead majorities in both houses of the Legislature. But when the opportunity arose last week to help the natural gas industry, those leaders threw property owners under the gas rig.

Generally, when a lawmaker who sponsors successful legislation later says he's not sure how it originated, it's a bad bill. So it was with Rep. Garth Everett, a Lycoming County Republican, who said after his bill passed that he couldn't remember the genesis of the amendment in question.

The two-line amendment deprives certain landowners of the leverage they otherwise would have in negotiating with gas drillers.

In the western part of Pennsylvania, where conventional gas and oil drilling occurred for generations prior to the exploitation of the Marcellus Shale, many landowners have old leases. Those contracts make no mention of "pooling" multiple parcels because drilling technology of the time could not achieve that.

Modern drilling and fracking techniques enable drillers to access the gas deep beneath multiple properties from a single surface drilling location.

The bill quietly passed last week allows drillers to pool land for gas extraction if the landowners' existing leases do not specifically prohibit it.

Reaching multiple parcels from a single location generally is a good thing economically and environmentally because it requires fewer wells to extract large amounts of gas.

But the new provision harms landowners by eliminating the leverage they otherwise would have in dealing with drillers. Rather than allowing them to renegotiate for more money or other considerations, as conditions for agreeing to pooling, the bill transfers all of the power to drillers.

The bill does not authorize "forced pooling," in which drillers may extract gas from beneath some land regardless of whether the landowner agrees to it, but it is a step in that direction.

Gov. Tom Corbett should veto the legislation to ensure that leaseholders are able to retain their leverage in dealing with drillers.

For the article go to ---> http://thetimes-tribune.com/opinion/everybody-into-pool-reluctantly...