Lawrence County

Ivan and Kathy Dubrasky are anti-drillers located in Pulaski Township (Lawrence County), PA, just across the border from Ohio and close to Youngstown. They recently hosted a tiny anti-drilling rally at their property (see Tiny Protest (in PA) Claims to be Part of “Hands Across Our Land”). Although all of their neighbors signed leases with Hilcorp, the Dubrasky’s, as is their right, stubbornly refused to do so. They’ve screwed themselves out of money they could have had. Hilcorp is drilling multiple wells from a pad right across the street from the Dubraskys. Hilcorp would like to sink one of those wells about 25 feet from the edge of the Dubrasky property line. State law says a gas well must be at least 330 feet away from an unleased property line. If a well is any closer, inevitably some of the gas from under the unleased property will seep into the fracked well–no matter how careful you are. Hilcorp says they won’t perforate the pipe/well along their property line, so no Dubrasky gas will seep out. A hearing will be held on Sept. 16 to consider Hilcorp’s request–a request likely to be granted. The hearing should be interesting. No doubt there will be fireworks…
Read More “Hilcorp Asks Permission to Drill 25 Feet from Unleased Landowner”

In May MDN told you about an unusual case in Pulaski Township (Lawrence County), PA where all three Board of Supervisors had a potential conflict of interest if they proceeded to approve a well pad for Hilcorp (see Conflict of Interest Prevents Hilcorp Wellpad Approval, What Now?). The proposed well pad would sit on one of the supervisors’ property. A second supervisor owns land adjacent to the first and his land would presumably be located in the first’s drilling unit. So they were both out of the running to make a motion. The third supervisor works for Hilcorp, so she couldn’t make the motion. We asked the question, what next? Now we know. A provision in Pennsylvania state law, according to a legal notice filed by Hilcorp, states that a decision “is deemed to have been rendered in favor of the applicant” after Hilcorp published legal ads on July 9 and 16. Anyone who wants to challenge it has 30 days to do so in the PA Court of Common Pleas (county court). No comment from anti-drillers at The Fracking Resistence, Lawrence County, PA (so far) other than to note that on their Facebook page that Supervisor Sam Varano will get a well pad after all…
Read More “Hilcorp Well Pad Approval Conundrum in Lawrence County Resolved”

A strange ending occurred at the Pulaski Township (Lawrence County), PA Board of Supervisors meeting Monday night. The marathon four hour hearing saw Pulaski’s three Supervisors (actually, two of the three) approve one of two conditional use permits to allow Hilcorp to construct a wellpad on the property of Victor A. Litwinovich on Topper Hill Road–much to the consternation of anti-fossil fuel ninnies who were present. But when it came to approving a second Hilcorp wellpad–on the property of Sam Varano and his wife, Beverly, on Evergreen Road–the board couldn’t get a single motion among the three Supervisors to approve it. Why? Because one of the Supervisors is Sam Varano himself–a clear conflict of interest. A second Supervisor is Greg Carna, who owns land adjacent to Varano that is leased to Hilcorp and, presumably, would be included in the Varano well drilling unit–also a conflict of interest. That left the third Supervisor, Lori Sniezek, who won’t vote any Hilcorp matters because she is employed full-time by Hilcorp. Ethics rules barred any of the three from making a motion to approve the wellpad. Without a motion, Varano gavelled the marathon session to a close. What will happen next?…
Read More “Conflict of Interest Prevents Hilcorp Wellpad Approval, What Now?”