Sen. Leach Asks Hard Questions About Corbett's $1.7 Billion Giveaway to Royal Dutch Shell Corp.

[JPZenger]

Last edited Wed Jun 13, 2012, 03:09 PM - Edit history (1)

http://media.philly.com/documents/20120608_shell_letter.pdf

Worth a read. Senator Leach is often known for his sense of humor, but this is a really serious matter.

[badhair77]

1. some excellent questions in that letter

It will be interesting to see if Corbett and Co acknowledge the letter much less answer the questions.

[JPZenger]

2. Corbett answered one question

Corbett yesterday answered one of those questions - the rumors that PA. is paying for all of huge cleanup costs at the old industrial site being used by Shell are not true.

Maybe that means PA. is only responsible for 80% of those costs.

[badhair77]

3. Thanks JPZ

I'm having trouble keeping up this week. I missed Corbett addressing the cleanup. From your response I presume he did not say the state would cover the cost of the ENTIRE site clean-up.

[JPZenger]

4. $1.7 billion for 600 jobs

Story on PA. statewide public radio tonight:

The site in Beaver County is occupied by a plant that employs 600 people. It is supposed to close and be replaced by the new Shell Cracker plant. The cracker plant is projected to employ 600 people, which is about the number employed in similar plants in Texas and Louisiana.

Corbett says we need to give away $1.7 billion in tax benefits because a study given to him by Shell said that the new cracker plant might attract many new chemical plants to southwestern PA. and those jobs could eventually total 10,000 or 20,000, or maybe even a brazillion!

When asked, Corbett said the state had not done any independent study of the job projections. But he needs the tax giveaways approved by the Legislature this week.