Trout Unlimited applauds Pennsylvania for not leasing state forest lands for Marcellus drilling

Contact:
Erin Mooney, Trout Unlimited - (215) 557-2845, emooney@tu.org [1]

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Trout Unlimited applauds Pennsylvania for not leasing state forest lands for Marcellus drilling

State officials say there are no plans to lease more state forest lands.

Harrisburg, P.A. — Trout Unlimited applauds Gov. Corbett and Pennsylvania officials for deciding not to keep additional state forest lands safe from Marcellus Shale development. At a state budget hearing yesterday, Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Secretary Richard Allen said that the state has no plans to lift the moratorium on leasing state-owned forest lands for drilling.

"Pennsylvania's state forest lands are valuable assets both to sportsmen and women and to the state's economy," said Ken Undercoffer, president of the Pennsylvania Council of Trout Unlimited. "We need to work together to preserve our heritage of hunting, fishing, trapping and other sporting opportunities on state lands."

In January, over 40 sportsmen groups and conservation organizations, representing more than 100,000 sportsmen and women in Pennsylvania, sent a letter [2] to Gov. Tom Corbett, asking that he not lease additional state forest lands for oil and gas development.

Over 700,000 acres — almost half of Pennsylvania's state forest lands within the Marcellus Shale region — have been leased for gas drilling.

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Trout Unlimited [3] is a non-profit organization with more than 147,000 members dedicated to conserving, protecting and restoring North America's trout and salmon fisheries and their watersheds. Follow TU on Facebook on Twitter via @TroutUnlimited.