PITTSBURGH To tax or not to tax?

Opponents and proponents of a severance tax on fracking in Pennsylvania aren't shy in making sure people understand their respective positions and have access to research on the topic.The leaders of the Associated Petroleum Industries of Pennsylvania, the Marcellus Shale Coalition and the Pennsylvania Independent Oil & Gas Association hosted a call last week to discuss fracking in the state, and the effect that a proposed severance tax could have on the industry and the region.The leaders of the three organizations were united in their opposition to a severance tax on fracking.Stephanie Catarino Wissman, executive director of API-PA, a division of the American Petroleum Institute, put it bluntly on behalf of her organization: "We are opposed to any level of a severance tax."Lou D'Amico, president and executive director of PIOGA, commented on the irony of Gov.-elect Tom Wolf campaigning on tax fairness."This is the only extractive industry in the state that's looking at an extraction tax," he said. Regardless of the rate of a severance tax, "how is any tax a 'fair tax?'"D'Amico discussed the limitations of the current infrastructure for the industry in Pennsylvania. "We simply can't get enough gas through the existing pipeline," he said. The issue "makes the state even less attractive."Dave Spigelmyer, president of MSC, noted all the financial benefits the industry brings to the state including tax revenue, local wages, impact fees and royalty revenue both to individuals and states. It's an opportunity, he said, to "build a manufacturing base that has been declining for the last four decades."The Keystone Research Center and Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center hosted a call, too. They are both self-described nonpartisan research organizations.The call was mainly to introduce a new study, "The Shale Tipping Point: The Relationship of Drilling to Crime, Truck Fatalities, STDs and Rents in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio" by the Multi-State Shale Research Collaborative, which was released the same day. The group brings together organizations and analysts from Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, Virginia and West Virginia.The paper notes the "human impacts" that communities see with increased drilling in the area.Mark Price, a labor economist with KRC, said some of the issues included increases in violent and property crimes, traffic fatalities and increased rent.These effects were most notable in six "heavy drilling" counties in Pennsylvania Bradford, Tioga, Carroll, Greene, Washington and Susquehanna.Stephen Herzenberg, an economist and executive director of KRC, said the report is a validation of the idea that some revenue from the industry should return to the community. "The impact fees are one way to do that," he said. But a severance tax could gather more revenue, to better help with these impacts.Price and Herzenberg are two of the report's six authors.As the impact-fee legislation is written, the impact fees would be repealed if a severance tax is passed if new legislation doesn't address that.Travis Windle, a spokesman for the MSC, pointed to recent analyses, including one from PricewaterhouseCoopers, which discusses the positive "shale effect" on manufacturing.The severance tax was a major issue in Wolf's campaign, though some analysts now note that the income projections he used may be significantly off the mark.Prior to the general election, some legislators seemed to indicate that such a tax was perhaps inevitable, including state Sen. Dominic Pileggi. But while Pileggi, a Republican, kept his seat in the election, he lost his position as majority leader later that month.Wesley Leckrone, a political science professor at Widener University, said at the time, "It's definitely a signal from the Republican caucus in the Senate that they want to play hardball with Gov.-elect Wolf. And particularly it's a shot across the bow about the idea of new taxes."Meanwhile, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced his administration would ban fracking in the Empire State. There had been a moratorium for the past several years, as government agencies studied the issue.