Taxes and Drilling: Revenue Potential for Municipal Governments?

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Video by Cris McConkey. March 22, 2012. Tompkins County Public Library, Ithaca, NY. How much in property taxes will be coming to local governments from gas drilling and when? Will drilling lower or raise my taxes? What is the process of taxing this resource? What’s a severance tax and why should New York create one? County Legislator Carol Chock and Caroline Supervisor Don Barber negotiate these questions and a maze of other taxation considerations surrounding gas drilling in this first of a series of presentations related to gas drilling presented by the Tompkins County Council of Governments.

This talk focuses on the amount of potential funding municipalities might expect should drilling come to town. Counties, cities, towns, and villages can expect increased costs should an uptick in drilling activity occur in the area. Whether it be fixing roads, adding police officers, monitoring air and water, or adding administrative staff, municipalities are concerned about being left empty-handed.

The Assessment and Land Valuation Subcommittee of the Tompkins County Council of Governments Gas Drilling Task Force has been studying these and other economic issues. They outline some of the potential concerns with the current system of taxation. Questions such as how gas is measured, who verifies the measurements, lag times between drilling and receipt of taxes, why anyone should care about a Unit of Production Value, and what is an ad valorum tax are explained. Includes a demonstration of the Town Tax Calculator, which helps estimate expected tax incomes.

The TCCOG Task Force on Gas Drilling seeks to network municipalities within Tompkins County, New York to manage the large amount of information surrounding drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus and Utica shales. For more information: http://www.tompkins-co.org/tccog/Gas_Drilling/Index_GasDrilling.html

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