Source: http://www.themarcellusshale.com/yet-another-municipality-regrets-being-conned-by-the-celdf/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 20:52:39+00:00

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Add Highland Township, Elk County, Pennsylvania to the growing list of communities conned by the CELDF who now regret being taken in by these radical scammers.
Highland Township, Elk County (population of 492) was taken in by the CELDF. It passed a a version of the same basic community rights Tom Linzey has used to manipulate other communities into supporting his revolutionary agenda using issues with bottled water plants, trains and others wherever he can find them. The smaller and more naive, the better, of course. Realizing, shortly after, that this strategy was going nowhere legally, the Supervisors seem to have been given the equally bright idea by Linzey they could simply avoid the Constitution by adopting a home rule charter. Now, those hopes have been dashed by a Federal Court decision once again demonstrating CELDF should be the acronym for Community of Elitist Lawyers Doing Flimflam.
Seneca Resources is a Pennsylvania corporation engaged in oil and natural gas exploration and production in various locations within the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, including Highland Township in Elk County. In January of 2014, Seneca Resources received a permit from the United States Environmental Protection Agency to convert an existing natural gas well into an underground injection control well (UIC). The company began work soon thereafter on securing a permit from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. An application was submitted to the DEP in November of 2014.
While Seneca Resources was engaged in the permitting process, Highland Township adopted an ordinance which, among other things, made it unlawful for corporations to deposit, store, treat, inject or process waste water, “produced” water, “frack” water, brine or other materials, chemicals or by-products that have been used in the extraction of shale gas onto or into the land, air, or waters within Highland Township. This prohibition specifically applied to UICs. Ordinance 1-9 of 2014, § 4(a).
Seneca Township challenged the Ordinance in February of 2015 in this Court. See Seneca Resources Corp. v. Highland Township, Elk County, Pennsylvania, C.A. No. 15-60Erie. The parties reached a settlement and this Court entered a Stipulation and Consent Decree. The parties stipulated that the Ordinance was unconstitutional and unenforceable. In August of 2016, this Court adopted the findings of the consent decree, adjudging the Ordinance to be unconstitutional, invalid, and unenforceable. That was not the end of the matter, however.
By referendum vote in November of 2016, Highland Township adopted a Home Rule Charter which, among other things, enshrined the provisions of the Ordinance previously invalidated by this Court. Section 401 of the Home Rule Charter prohibits any corporation from engaging in the depositing of waste water from oil and gas extraction within the Township. Further, Section 404 of the Charter provides that “No permit, license, privilege, charter, or other authorization, issued by any state or federal entity, that would enable any corporation or person to violate the rights or prohibitions of this Charter, shall be lawful within Highland Township.” Other sections of the Charter provide for fines for any violations of its provisions and create standing for entities such as ecosystems and “natural communities.” Section 410 of the Charter declares that Highland Township will only recognize a federal or state law to the extent it does not violate the rights and prohibitions outlined in the Charter.
Seneca Resources initiated this action on November 30, 2016, challenging the Township’s Home Rule Charter which directly precludes its ability to create and operate an injection well within the Township. Seneca Resources has moved to invalidate the entire Home Rule Charter, and to both temporarily and permanently enjoin Highland Township and the Board of Supervisors (the “Board”) from enforcing the Charter.
More specifically, the company alleges that the Home Rule Charter is preempted by the federal Safe Drinking Water Act; the Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Act; and is an impermissible exercise of police power and legislative authority. Seneca Resources also alleges that the Charter offends the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause and the First Amendment, as well as violates the company’s rights to both substantive and procedural due process.
As relief, Plaintiff seeks a declaratory judgment, inter alia, that the Home Rule Charter as a whole is a) preempted by federal and state law; b) is an impermissible exercise of police power by the Township; c) is a violation of the Supremacy Clause; d0) constitutes illegal exclusionary zoning; e) constitutes an impermissible exercise of legislative authority; f) is a violation of Seneca’s First Amendment rights; and g) is a violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
Note how Pennsylvania DEP was manipulated in this process, initially acquiescing in the delay strategy of the CELDF. They had an excuse, of course, but hardly a good one and, fortunately, they made up for it in a big way by suing the Township themselves. The Township, it’s also worth pointing out, agreed their ordinance was “unconstitutional, invalid, and unenforceable” but still allowed itself to be convinced a Home Rule Charter would somehow correct the error and make it all constitutional.
Here, the plain terms of Act 13 indicate that a local ordinance purporting to regulate oil and gas operations must be adopted pursuant to the MPC and the Flood Plain Management Act. Seneca alleges that the adoption of the Home Rule Charter was not in compliance with either the MPC or the Flood Plain Management Act and Defendants do not deny this allegation.
Because the actual language of the Home Rule Charter highlights irrational and arbitrary behavior de facto, Seneca’s motion for judgment on the pleadings on this claim is granted as violative of Plaintiff’s substantive due process rights.
Plaintiff argues that many other provisions of the Home Rule Charter are inextricably intertwined with § § 401, 404, and 501 so that they should be severed from the Home Rule Charter. Defendants agree that these provisions should be severed.
Sections 103-106, 109 and 110 relate to the prevention of oil and gas activities and intend to create “rights” and “standing” in residents of the Township, ecosystems, and the Township. These sections are incapable of execution by themselves without § § 401, 404, and 501.
Sections 405-408 provide for the enforcement the Home Rule Charter: § 405 makes it an offense to violate the Home Rule Charter, while § § 406-408 create the mechanism by which the Home Rule Charter should be enforced. These sections are inextricably intertwined with § 401, 404, and 501.
Sections 409, 410, and 411 are also inextricably intertwined with the offending sections. These sections provide for: the enforcement and intervention to enforce or defend the Home Rule Charter (§ 409); the elevation of the Home Rule Charter over existing state and federal laws (§ 410); and instructions to courts to liberally interpret the provisions of Article One of the Home Rule Charter (§ 411).
Because all of these provisions cannot stand on their own, these will be invalidated.
So ends most of the Home Rule Charter insofar as it relates to anything Seneca Resources wants to do. The CELDF, yet again, conned a tiny community, which barely got out the bad deal with its shirt. Another lesson learned as Tom Linzey takes his extremist blather to some new patsy, using the money of equally extremist trust-funder run elitist foundations. Sad.
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