On February 10, the PA Environmental Defense Foundation filed a motion with Commonwealth Court continuing its efforts to prevent the unconstitutional spending of DCNR Oil and Gas Fund monies for nonconservation purposes.

“Through the multiple Commonwealth Court and [PA] Supreme Court decisions related to PEDF’s challenges to spending of ERA [Environmental Rights Amendment] trust assets derived from the degradation of the State Forest, PEDF has prevailed in establishing that the money generated from the extraction and sale of oil and natural gas from our State Forest and deposited into the Oil and Gas Lease Fund remains part of the corpus of the ERA trust and must be used solely to conserve and maintain our public natural resources for the benefit of current and future generations.

“PEDF has also prevailed in establishing that legislative appropriations and Fiscal Code provisions transferring $383,000,000 in trust assets from the Oil and Gas Lease Fund to the General Fund to pay for annual general state government operations violated the ERA.”

The motion asks the Court to (page 184)--

-- Declare the Environmental Rights Amendment trust purposes to be achieved in managing our state forest and park trust corpus is to conserve and maintain these public natural resources … for current and future generations of Pennsylvanians;

-- Declare the public natural resources of the state forest ERA Trust encompass the natural ecology of the forest;

-- Declare that the respondents’ ERA trustee duties require sustaining the ecosystem of the state forest for current and future generations of Pennsylvanians;

-- Declare that statutorily authorized uses of the state forest for non-trust purposes have caused and continue to cause degradation of the state forest ecosystem;

-- Declare the respondents have a duty to remedy the ongoing degradation to the natural ecology of the state forest to restore the state forest trust corpus;

-- Declare that all deposits in the Oil and Gas Lease Fund have been part of the ERA trust corpus; and

-- Declare respondents spent Oil and Gas Lease Fund for non-trust purposes.

Click Here for a copy of the full motion.

Visit the PA Environmental Defense Foundation website for more information.  Questions should be directed to attorney John Childe by email to: childeje@aol.com.

Related Articles:

-- PA Supreme Court: Accounting Required For Environmental Rights Amendment Trust Fund Money From State Forest Oil & Gas Drilling  [PaEN]

--  PA Environmental Defense Foundation Files Lawsuit To Stop Northcentral Regional ATV Trail Connector Project As Violation Of Public Trust Responsibilities  [PaEN]

-- NO SPECIAL PROTECTION: The Exceptional Value Loyalsock Creek In Lycoming County Is Dammed And Damned - Video Dispatch From The Loyalsock - By Barb Jarmoska, Keep It Wild PA [PaEN]

-- Exceptional Value Water Quality Designation, State Forest Land, River Honors Were Not Enough To Protect Loyalsock Creek From Natural Gas Drilling & Pipelines In Lycoming County - By Friends Of The 'Sock  [PaEN]

[Posted: February 13, 2023]

2/20/2023