(part 2 of 3)
[Part 1: Lackawanna College, a two-year college in
Scranton, Pa., accepted a $2.5 million endowment from Cabot Oil & Gas Corp.
to strengthen that college’s programs and ties to the oil and gas industry.]
Two of the reasons Pennsylvania has no
severance tax and one of the lowest taxes upon shale gas drilling are because
of an overtly corporate-friendly legislature and a research report from Penn
State, a private state-related university that receives about $300 million a year in public funds.
Opponents of the tax cited a Penn State
study that claimed a 30 percent decline in drilling if the fees were assessed,
while also touting the economic benefits of drilling in the Marcellus Shale.
What wasn’t widely known is that the lead author of the study, Dr. Timothy
Considine, “had a history of producing industry-friendly research on economic
and energy issues,” according to reporting by Jim
Efsathioi Jr. of Bloomberg News. The Penn State study was sponsored by a
$100,000 grant from the Marcellus Shale Coalition, an oil and gas lobbying
group that represents more than 300 energy companies. Dr. William Easterling, dean of Penn
State’s College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, said the study may
have “crossed the line between policy analysis and policy advocacy.”
The
Marcellus Center for Outreach and Research
(MCOR), a part of Penn State, announced
that with funding provided by General Electric
and ExxonMobil, it would offer a “Shale Gas Regulators
Training Program.” The Center had previously said it wasn’t taking funding from
private industry. However, the Center’s objectivity may have already been
influenced by two people. Gov. Tom Corbett, who accepted
more than $2.6 million in campaign funds from oil and gas company personnel, sits
on the university’s board of trustees; billionaire Terrence (Terry) Pegula, owner
of the Buffalo Sabres hockey team, was CEO of East Resources, which he had sold
to Royal Dutch Shell for $4.7 billion in July 2010. Pegula and his wife had
also contributed
about $380,000 to Corbett’s political campaign. On the day Pegula donated $88
million to Penn State to fund a world-class ice hockey arena and support the
men’s and women’s intercollegiate ice hockey team, he said,
“[T]his contribution could be just the tip of the iceberg, the first of many
such gifts, if the development of the Marcellus Shale is allowed to proceed.”
At the groundbreaking in April 2012, Pegula announced
he increased the donation to $102 million.
The Shale Technology and Education Center (ShaleTEC)
program at the Pennsylvania College of Technology, a branch of Penn State, was
established “to serve as the central resource for workforce development and
education needs of the community and the oil and natural gas industry,”
according to its website.
With an
initial $15,000 grant from the Marcellus Shale Coalition, the Community College
of Philadelphia (CCP) planned to establish certificate and academic programs
for workers either already employed by or intending to enter jobs that provide
services to Marcellus Shale companies. In a news release loaded with pro-Corbett
and pro-industry appeal, college president Stephen M. Curtis announced in
November 2012, “The goal is to support the supply chain now serving
energy companies and offer specialized career training that connects
residents to the high-pay, high-demand career paths.” John Braxton, assistant professor
of biology and an ecologist, said CCP “must not be used as a PR puppet for
shale gas fracking companies,”
accurately noting that the fracking industry “got
a free publicity ride” by the administration’s hasty decisions. Within
two weeks of CCP’s announcement, the faculty union (AFT Local 2026), which
represents the college’s 1,050 faculty and 200 staff, condemned the decision to
establish the Center “without the consideration or approval of the faculty, and
with total disregard for established College procedures for instituting new academic curricula.” In a unanimous vote
by the Representative Council, the
faculty declared, “the natural gas drilling . . . industry and peripheral and
related industries present unacceptable
dangers and risks to public health, worker safety, the natural environment, and
quality of life.” Curtis left CCP
in June 2013; the proposed program was never developed, and remains unfunded.
In April 2011, Gov. Corbett had suggested
that the 14 universities of the State System of Higher Education (SSHE) could
allow natural gas drilling on the campuses
that sit on top of the Marcellus Shale. The ensuing Act, passed by the
Republican-controlled legislature, includes clauses to compromise the
universities’ academic integrity. In
exchange for supporting fracking, the new act allows the university where the
gas is extracted to retain one-half of all royalties; 35 percent would go to
the other state universities; 15 percent would be used for tuition assistance
at the 14 state universities. California and Mansfield universities have
already begun to profit from fracking.
In a secret negotiation revealed by the Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette, the Student Association of California University signed over
mineral rights on 67 acres. The lease includes a confidentiality clause.
The Marcellus Institute at Mansfield
University is
“an academic/shale gas partnership,” designed to educate the people about the
issues of natural gas production. The university holds summer classes for
teachers and week-long camps for high school students to allow them to “Learn
about the development of shale gas resources in our region and the career and
educational opportunities available to you after high school!”
The university’s associate in applied sciences
(A.A.S.) degree in natural gas production and services, begun in Fall semester
2012, was fast-tracked,
submitted and approved in less than six months rather than the 12–18
months normally required for approval. The university “will take as many
students as we can,” said Lindsey Sikorski, the Institute’s director, although
only one new faculty position was approved. The
SSHE administration encourages larger class sizes and fewer permanent
professors. The program, Sikorski says, “is not one of advocacy for the
industry, and all sides will be considered.” The program has not received any
grants from the industry; Sikorski said she “doesn’t want there to be any
conflicts of interest” that would “compromise the integrity of the program.”
However, the reality is that energy companies and their lobbying groups may
eventually fill a financial hole created by Corbett cutting higher education
funding and the system’s chancellor refusing to protect academic integrity in
the state-owned universities. (Neither Chancellor John Cavanaugh nor his
successor, Frank Brogan, responded to repeated calls.)
The union that represents the state system’s 6,000
faculty passed a resolution in September 2013 opposing drilling on campuses, stating that the
campuses “are not appropriate locations for
[fracking] given the environmental
and health hazards of the fracking process.”
[Part 3:
Compromising academic integrity at other American universities.]
[Dr. Brasch is an award-winning journalist and
professor emeritus of mass communications. He is author of 20 books, including Fracking
Pennsylvania, a critically-acclaimed in-depth investigation of the
process and effects of high volume hydraulic horizontal fracturing throughout
the country.]
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