The House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee is scheduled to consider amendments to legislation establishing a natural gas production severance tax on September 11.

House Bill 113 (Harper-R-Montgomery) would enact a 3.5 percent natural gas severance tax and leave the existing drilling impact fee in place.  Proceeds from the severance tax would help fund school employee pension obligations and provide State Police protection to rural areas (sponsor summary).

The amendments that could be considered include--

-- Rep. Maher/A03038: Change the Act 13 “Impact Fee” to “Severance Tax” and delete the severance tax provisions;

-- Rep. Carroll/A03054: Fix for the definition of stripper well definition as a result of a Commonwealth Court decision in March to prevent loss of revenue to Act 13 impact fee;

-- Rep. Tallman/A03250: Reducing the severance tax from 3.5 percent to 1.75 percent; and

-- A03296: Eliminate Act 13 impact fee, replace with 5 percent severance tax with the same distribution.

A discharge resolution requesting committee consideration of the bill was filed on July 11.

The meeting will be held in Room 31B of the Main Capitol Building at noon.  Committee meetings are frequently webcast through the House Republican Caucus website.

Rep. John Maher (R-Allegheny) serves as Majority Chair of the House Environmental Committee and can be contacted by sending email to: jmaher@pahousegop.com.  Rep. Mike Carroll serves as Minority Chair and can be contacted by sending email to: mcarroll@pahouse.net.

NewsClips:

Op-Ed: A Severance Tax Won’t Cure The State’s Budget Woes

Op-Ed: Natural Gas Severance Tax Will Deflate PA’s Economy

[Posted: Sept. 8, 2017]

9/11/2017