WV Farm Bureau Magazine April 2015 | Page 10

OWNERSHIP, not the royalty RATE, as many had been misled to believe. Therefore, mineral owners could get much more than the minimum 12.5% royalty on a tract with no deductions and no maximum limit, depending upon negotiations or what the West Virginia Oil & Gas Conservation Commission would decide. HB 2688 would also have provided for changes to the West Virginia Oil & Gas Conservation Commission. The first change would be the addition of two members to the Oil & Gas Conservation Commission, as many felt the current make up was slanted toward the oil and gas industry. One of the new members would represent surface owners and be from the largest agriculture organization in the state; the other would represent mineral owners. Neither would be allowed to be affiliated with the oil and gas industry. Second, the bill allowed for an appeals process if parties are not in agreement with the Oil and Gas Conservation Commission decisions. Also, the state Geologist would be included as a member of the commission. Many people were unhappy because they believed HB 2688 did nothing to address the problem of minerals that have been separated from the surface - but this was not true. The bill did provide for the eventual reuniting of the minerals of lost and unaccountable owners by the surface owner. Many asked why transparency issues with the oil and gas industry were not addressed (i.e., record keeping, timeliness of royalty payments, tax issues). Addressing these in the same bill would have required the bill to be “triple referenced” – meaning it would have had to go through and be approved by several committees before it could be introduced on the floor. In most cases, this causes a bill to die because the process simply takes too long. 10 West Virginia Farm Bureau News Another misconception pushed by opponents of the bill was the threat of losing property – which was completely untrue. No one was at risk of losing their land. They would continue to own the surface. NOTHING in this bill threatened their ownership. The key thing – for people interested in personal property rights – is that this bill gained more for deep wells th [