American Oil and Gas Reporter - April 2019 - 110

ConventionCoverage: Ohio Oil & Gas Association

Ohio Legislators Work
On Budget, Rules
By Dan Holder
COLUMBUS, OH.-Ohio started its
biennium budget process in early March,
with its House of Representatives approving a transportation funding bill. Because those financial plans establish spending priorities and focus attention on issues
important to oil and natural gas production,
Senate President Pro Tempore Bob Peterson, R-Washington Court House, urged
members of the Ohio Oil & Gas Association to communicate with their legislators
about the issue.
Peterson participated in a legislative
leadership panel during OOGA's annual
meeting, held March 6-8 at the Hilton
Columbus at Easton, in Columbus. In
addition to setting up Ohio's fiscal system
for the next two years, he noted legislators
were tackling regulatory reform through
SB 1, introduced by Senate President
Larry Obhof, R-Medina.
"I know from my farming business
that regulatory issues often times create
extra costs," he said. "They drive people
from bidding on projects. SB 1 requires
every state agency to look at all the regulations, with the target of reducing them

30 percent over the next three years. We
all want health, safety and a clean environment, but nobody would suggest that
we couldn't do away with some of these
regulations."
In his analysis of the transportation
budget bill, OOGA Executive Vice President
Matt Hammond noted the association typically steered clear of issues such as the
proposed 18 cents a gallon gasoline tax increase. But, he said that stance changed
when he discovered the bill included a provision to divert $5 million a year for the
next two years from the oil and gas well
fund for distribution to local governments.
"This association always has opposed,
and our membership always has been
lockstep, against diverting revenue from
the oil and gas well fund and distributing
it elsewhere, whether to local governments,
the general revenue fund or for income
tax cuts," he said.
OOGA will take the offense on several
issues during the 2019 legislative session,
Hammond reported, pointing to the cost
recovery fee and unitization as two topics
of interest. He said the fee first was imposed in 2010, when the Ohio Division
of Natural Resources experienced a fund-

Posing before the legislative leadership panel at the Ohio Oil & Gas Association's
annual meeting are, from left, OOGA Executive Vice President Matt Hammond; Amanda
Finn, chairman of the association's Government Affairs Committee; and Senate President
Pro Tempore Bob Peterson, R-Washington Court House.

110 THE AMERICAN OIL & GAS REPORTER

ing shortfall. The association then supported the levy on producers, but with
ODNR now fully funded, he said OOGA
proposed the fee end.
Meanwhile, he continued, unitization
is "the issue that will never, never go
away for us." he indicated. He said OOGA
was asking legislators to clarify the minimum acreage in the lease agreement,
which now was 65 percent, and to eliminate the well transfer fee. Hammond said
legislators in the 2018 session agreed to
reduce the $100 a well fee to $25, and he
wanted to totally eliminate it.
Amanda Finn, chairman of OOGA's
Government Affairs Committee, reported
the state's operating budget was scheduled
for release on March 15. Unlike other
years, when the association expected negative impacts on oil and gas operators,
she said she didn't expect the industry to
be a prime revenue target in 2019.
Accessing State Acreage
According to Senator Peterson, one of
the Republican majority's priorities in 2019
was reforming policies that affected access
to state acreage for exploration and production operations. He recalled several
years ago legislators approved a measure
establishing a leasing commission to oversee
that process, but the panel never came together under Governor John Kasich.
Finn described an effective and operating leasing commission as a top priority
for her company, Ascent Resources LLC.
"We are fortunate that we are a younger
company, and we still are putting together
units that historically have had 100 percent
participation by landowners. Unitizing
acreage to this point has not been a struggle
for Ascent; however, this year, because of
increased activity, we will be utilizing that
application process," she said.
"State highways, which are covered
in the state leasing issue, specifically
highways 470 and 70, are two major
roads that are preventing us from putting
together certain units. At this point, we
can develop a unit, but if a portion of the
proposed unit is on the other side of a
state-owned road, we are not able to complete the unit because of not being able

American Oil and Gas Reporter - April 2019

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