Highland Township’s controversial home rule charter has been stripped of its oil and gas provisions by a federal judge.
On Friday, Magistrate Judge Susan Baxter in Erie ruled in favor of Seneca Resources Corp. in a lawsuit versus Highland Township.
Baxter granted judgment on the pleas for six counts, declaring the oil and gas provisions of the voter-adopted home rule charter “invalid, unenforceable and unconstitutional.”
Rob Boulware, spokesman for Seneca, said, “Seneca Resources has always maintained the opinion that certain sections of Highland Township’s home rule charter were unconstitutional and we are pleased with Judge Baxter’s decision.”
A call to the Highland Township municipal building was not immediately returned. The township’s attorney, Arthur Martinucci of Erie, declined to comment on the ruling.
The saga over oil and gas rights in Highland Township has been ongoing for several years. In 2013, at the urging of Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, the township enacted a community bill of rights. The bill was an effort to stop Seneca Resources from placing an injection well within a half mile of the township’s water source.
Seneca filed a federal lawsuit, and Highland Township supervisors rescinded the bill of rights. A stipulation and consent decree was filed in federal court at the time, agreeing, in essence, that Seneca would drop the lawsuit if the bill was rescinded.
A government study commission was formed in the township, and eventually opted to become a home rule community. Again with the help of CELDF, the commission drafted a home rule charter, adopting many of the same provisions that were objected to in the community bill of rights.
Voters in Highland Township approved a resolution to adopt the home rule charter. And Seneca filed suit again, challenging the provisions of the charter which purported to ban injection wells within the township. Township officials acknowledged in this suit that the portions of the charter dealing with oil and gas were illegal, but told the federal judge they could not repeal it, as it was voted in by referendum.
In Friday’s ruling, Baxter analyzed the counts that Seneca alleged were violated by Highland Township’s charter.
The federal Safe Drinking Water Act “establishes a national program for regulating injection wells in order to protect underground sources of drinking water,” the judge wrote. “This provision creates a direct obstacle to Congress’ intentions to create a cooperative system…” and stands as an obstacle to federal law.
Regarding the Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Act, the judge wrote, “Local legislation cannot permit that which a state statute forbids or prohibit that which state enactments allow.” The state Oil and Gas Act permits injection wells, which means the home rule charter cannot prohibit them.
Baxter also ruled the charter practiced exclusionary zoning in violation of state law, attempted to eliminate the ability of corporations to seek redress in the court system and clashed with federal and state law in regard to protections afforded to corporations.
The judge noted in her decision that Highland Township did not defend the provisions of the charter, but acknowledged the “unconstitutionality and unenforceability of the charter.” They did, however, ask the judge not to award any damages, costs or counsel fees against the township.
The charter has been successfully challenged in Pennsylvania court as well.
The state Department of Environmental Protection challenged the legality of the home rule charter in Commonwealth Court and won.
