In what is expected to be the last major fight in the legislature over Colorado’s proposed new rules for oil and gas drilling, the state Senate gave initial approval today to the controversial regulations.
The vote, which broke along party lines, came after Republicans made an unsuccessful, last-ditch effort to sway moderate Democrats to make some changes to the rules, which are designed to protect the environment and public health from drilling side-effects. The Republicans hoped to increase certain protections for drinking water and to raise fines for some rules violations in exchange for stripping out a number of regulations.
Democrats summarily rejected the change, and, afterward, Republicans conceded the fight in the legislature is basically over. The rules still need final approval in the Senate, expected to come tomorrow, but bills rarely change between the initial and the final approval. Gov. Bill Ritter, who has defended the rules, is expected to sign them.
“There are a lot of Democrats with reservations about this,” Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, asserted. “But they’re moving with lockstep discipline. They didn’t give an inch today.”
While one Democrat, Sen. Jim Isgar, D-Hesperus, did raise concerns about some of the proposed rules today, other Democrats offered full-voiced support.
“We have been overwhelmed with an industry that has grown very rapidly,” said Sen. Gail Schwartz, D-Snowmass Village. “I think it’s time in our state that we have a chance to catch up.”
The rules impose a number of new requirements on how drillers operate in Colorado. They prohibit wells from drilling too close to drinking water sources, they seek to protect important wildlife habitat and they require extra steps to prevent hazardous chemical spills.
Republicans say the rules also impose new costs on drilling companies, which have significantly scaled back their operations across the West in response to the flagging economy. Those costs could amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars extra per well, said Sen. Al White, R-Hayden.
White said he thought the Republicans’ compromise would bring necessary balance to the rules in a way that both protects the public and allows the energy industry to thrive.
“I think we’re very close,” White said.
But Democrats said they didn’t have enough time to review the amendment and said rewriting the rules is outside of their scope. The legislature is reviewing the rules as part of House bill 1292, which is a broader look at all rules approved by state agencies in the last year.
“There’s actually no precedent to rewrite executive branch rules through the rule-review process,” said Sen. Jennifer Veiga, D-Denver.
Veiga said, instead, lawmakers should make changes to the rules through separate bills. But, with four bills relating to the rules already killed, both Democrats and Republicans said they don’t expect any more rules-related bills to come this session.
