By Nicole Houck, Contributing Writer

Governor Tom Corbett’s budget left environmentalists with mixed feelings, mostly negative. Criticisms over the (not unexpected) lack of severance tax in the budget were heard all over the state from environmental groups and concerned legislators. On the other hand, they were relieved that Corbett’s budget doesn’t rely on income from leasing more state land for gas drilling.

“Governor Corbett’s failure to propose a drilling tax is a choice to place the burden of paying for the costs of damage to the environment and local communities on state and local taxpayers, rather than the drillers,” said Jan Jarrett, president and CEO of environmental group PennFuture. “With growing concerns about the safety of drilling, Tom Corbett continues to paint drilling as an unequivocal positive. And he refuses to have the drilling industry pay its fair share for the use of our natural gas.”

State Rep. Greg Vitali (D-Delaware) seemed prepared for the news. He set up a television screen in the Capitol rotunda which showed the second-by-second revenue that the state could have earned, had it enacted a small severance tax from the start. It was in the neighborhood of $147 million on Tuesday.

“I don’t want to be critical of the governor,” State Rep. Camille “Bud” George (D-Clearfield) told PoliticsPA, “but the governor got nearly a million dollars from the Shale people, and he promised there would be no tax but the amusing thing is he stands to give a speech that he wants to protect our land and water. Now, if we’re not going to ruin any water, I’d be the most surprised person in the world.”

“The truth is that really and reasonably, there’s only one other state besides us that doesn’t charge for extraction. Even some of the gas people admitted there should be an extraction tax. My extraction tax when I put it in wasn’t to do anything but for the local area that was going to experience the difficulties from the broken roads, the loss of water. The truth is that I think he’s wrong. I think he’ll live to see the day where he sees he’s wrong,” George added.

“The governor is leaving money on the table – money we desperately need to invest in local communities and education and our environment,” said Jarrett. “Without the drilling tax that every other major drilling state has, more than $150 million has already been lost to Pennsylvania and her citizens.”

“We were relieved to see that the governor does not rely on revenue from more drilling leases in state forestland to fill the budget hole. The governor apparently took the advice of the experts at the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources who concluded that leasing more land would irreparably damage Penn’s Woods,” Jarrett added, on an ever so slightly more positive note.

Managing Editor Keegan Gibson contributed to this report.