Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Arkansas Politics / Gas drilling Sheffield Nelson goes after Sen. Dismang
Posted by Max Brantley on Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 10:33 AM
- Cheree Franco
- Sheffield Nelson at today's press conference
Sheffield Nelson's news conference this morning apparently will be an opportunity to bang Sen. Jonathan Dismang, an advocate for shale gas exploration, for receiving campaign contributions from gas companies.
I'm awaiting more details. It's certainly fair game, as I've said, to note financial support from beneficiaries of legislative advocacy. If Nelson pushes ahead with an assertion that it's a potential ethics violation, I'd need to know more than I know now.
But financial ties are useful tools for somebody pushing a gas severance tax, as Nelson is, against legislators, like Dismang, who say it would be a terrible thing.
Update from Cheree Franco:
Sheffield Nelson, who is spearheading a statewide campaign to collect the 62,500 signatures needed to make an increased severance tax a ballot initiative in November 2012, said the only thing clear to him at this point is that Sen. Dismang's position on the gas severance tax represents an apparent conflict of interest. He has no plans at this point to file a formal complaint about it.
Dismang is a former chairman of the board of Arkansas National Association of Royalty Owners, which represents the interests of gas and oil company investors. "This is not legislation, this is lobbying," said Nelson. It's an unpaid position, Dismang said, that he held before he became a legislator.
According to Dismang's itemized list of campaign contributions in the final fund-raising period of 2008 — "the beginning of the romance," as Nelson put it — Southwestern Energy Company in Fayetteville contributed $750; Chesapeake Operating, Inc., a gas company out of Oklahoma City, contributed $1,000; Little Rock's Stephens Group, which has oil and gas holdings, contributed $500; and Houston's XTO Energy contributed $500. This was about a fourth of $13,680 in total contributions in that period. Gas industry money also came into his 2010 campaign.
Dismang defended himself in a prepared statement:
I am disappointed that Mr. Nelson has decided to attack me personally. I have great respect for Mr. Nelson and I appreciate much of the work he has done for Arkansas. He has in fact, supported and acted as a wonderful advocate for several charities that are near and dear to my heart. However, my district is in the shale play, and I will not apologize for standing up for my neighbor that was struggling to support his family and is now making $60,000 a year because of a job created by the natural gas industry. I will not apologize for standing up for our local jobs and the future of our local economy. My record shows that I am an advocate for the families in my district, and I am very proud of that fact. Today's press conference should be seen as what it is: a publicity stunt. I hope we can move past this needless discourse and get back to a discussion based on facts.
In response to a question, Dismang also said he was no royalty or lease owner, but served in the royalty group because of his knowledge of the industry. He noted that his first term in the legislature he supported a bill that the gas industry opposed — on eminent domain — because it was in his district's interest.
Nelson doesn't think Dismang's views represent the majority of voters in his district. "Most people are not benefiting from this industry. It's doing a lot of good for a very few people. It's tearing up roads and using massive water reserves, which people know they'll end up paying for down the road. This may cost him re-election."
Nelson, a former gas company executive, pointed out that many energy companies operating within Arkansas are not based in the state. "These companies make $3.5 billion in the sale of corporate gas, and that will never hit Arkansas banks," he said. "I'm not mad at the industry, I'm mad at what they're doing to Arkansas, and that I'm paying for this."
He said the petition has thousands of signatures and that they plan to continue to canvas with unpaid volunteers. The Municipal League is backing the drive and is expected to make a big push at the primary election in May.
Speaking of...
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May 4, 2012For your reading pleasure: A policy maker's guide to the pluses and minuses of shale gas production from the National Conference of State Legislatures, a non-partisan, non-industry funded organization. /more/
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Nelson on right side of gas tax debate
April 11, 2012Sheffield Nelson is an odd person to be waging a one-man crusade against the business and political establishment to raise taxes on the Texas and Oklahoma gas producers who have been drilling in the Arkansas shale. /more/
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Sheffield Nelson, unlikely severance tax champion
April 10, 2012Times columnist Ernest Dumas, who draws on nearly a half-century of coverage of Arkansas politics, including the essential role gas exploration and taxation have played in politics, examines today former gas executive Sheffield Nelson's somewhat role as a severance tax champion and his past leadership of the very business orgtanizations fighting him today. /more/
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Sheffield Nelson schools Beebe on severance tax
April 6, 2012I never really expected Gov. Mike Beebe, who cut his teeth golfing with the lobby in the Senate, to be a supporter of the Sheffield Nelson-backed initiative to raise the pitifully low severance tax on natural gas. /more/
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Stands accused
March 21, 2012Is the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce "un-American," as Sheffield Nelson suggests? It's a close call; reasonable men might disagree. That the Chamber is unconscionable, on the other hand, was verified long ago. /more/
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An environmentalist's call for responsible fracking
February 28, 2012Here's the side that's missing in Arkansas from the cheerleading of shale gas production iat almost any cost — unpaid damage to county roads being the least of it. /more/
- More »
Comments (8)
Showing 1-8 of 8
Sheffield has done battle with Witt and Jack before. I doubt Jonathan intimidates Mr. Nelson very much.
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dislike
Yes, he's done battle with Witt and Jack and the battle keeps going while they are in the grave. I know deep down Sheffield blames the Stephens from keeping him out of the Gov's mansion and then for a White House run. He takes the political glory of reaping the natural gas harvest while his friend Jerry reaps the business harvest. I'm sure he even thinks he could have been Bill Clinton instead of Clinton himself.
But why as the ruler of the natural gas empire, did he not levy these taxes on himself? Why did he not get a hire tax a few years ago when it was changed instead of just an "adequate" one?
The personal vindication he wants against a dying breed of Stephens is ridiculous to watch. The good Senator has taken on the titan of the retired gas industry of opposing tyranny in the form of a tax hike. Let's do a dig up of funds received and from who when Mr. Nelson ran for public service.
"...[T]yranny in the form of a tax hike..."? Sheffield has put forward a ballot question. That means the people vote. You know - Regnat Populus?
Our founders were not anarchists and they did not oppose all taxation. They opposed taxation without representation. (Note they did not even fight for direct democracy but only for representative rule.) There is no tyranny to the severance tax if it is passed by the people.
Reading those "contributions", it's always a little disturbing how cheaply the worthies sell their selves. I guess only they know their true worth - or lack of same.
He needed to add a few more of those "shale caucus" cheerleaders in there. They all have received in kind contributions from the same sources.
The restaurant industry employs more people and contributes more revenue to state coffers but they don't get a "diner caucus" nor has anyone advocated turning the Health Dept over to them like the gas industry has been given control of AOGC and ADEQ.
70%, the problem in macroeconomic terms is that you have an unbalanced market. The buy side is an oligopoly controlled by a few payers who coordinate their contributions. The sell side is a fragmented or competitive (commoditized) market. Simply put, if the "worthies" hold out for too much the oligopoly will simply find another (low-cost) supplier (candidate).
70%er, there's way too many Ho's in the Lege for any of them to corner the market on Ho-dom. It's good too, Ark Ho's work for less.
Supply and demand ya know.
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