Gas Drilling Moratorium for Bucks, Montgomery Counties

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4. Leaders of state and local environmental groups spoke out against the exemption.

http://www.phillyburbs.com/my_town/palisades/legislature-to-vote-today-on-gas-drilling-moratorium-for-bucks/article_5ece9717-8d8e-5e87-ae87-2737c134a187.html

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Leaders of state and local environmental groups spoke out against the exemption earlier in the day. "They should either exempt all counties from Act 13 and not just try to get special treatment from Sen. McIlhinney's core area, or repeal the law entirely," said David Meiser, chairman of the Bucks County Sierra Club.

Delaware Riverkeeper Network Deputy Director Tracy Carluccio said the provision was "outrageous." "This really smacks of cronyism and self-preservation in order to protect a few elite areas in this state that have more power than others," she said.

"This is absolutely wrong. This kind of favoritism where a legislator thinks he can protect himself and his turf at the expense of everybody else is what people cannot tolerate and what they complain about in politics today. We should be making decisions about gas drilling based on sound public policy — not based on what some legislator thinks he can slip in in order to save his own neck."

McIlhinney said he doesn't understand the push-back from the Delaware Riverkeeper Network and other environmental groups. "They don't want (the provision) because they want a whole statewide moratorium," he said. "I don't think I can get enough votes together to now just put a moratorium across the entire Marcellus Shale."

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