Officials send BLM letter over oil and gas regs

A group including elected officials, school district superintendents, economic development officials and organization leaders gathered at San Juan College on Thursday to express their concerns over pending federal oil and gas rules they said would lead to damaging economic impacts to San Juan County. The group, which included all four of the county's mayors, held a press conference at the college's Quality Center for Business to draw attention to a letter making the case that the implementation of proposed regulations for oil and gas production on federal land in their current form — the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's "Waste Prevention, Production Subject to Royalties, and Resource Conservation" rules  — would cause more job losses and permanently close natural gas wells in the San Juan Basin. Members of the group said the proposed rules would worsen a prolonged local economic decline brought on by the low commodity market prices of oil and gas. That price plunge has resulted in the loss of more than 1,000 local jobs in the last year and reduced the collection of taxes, royalties and fees from oil and gas production that fund services at the city and county levels, contributing to the city earning the inglorious distinction of recently being ranked first in the U.S. in the rate of unemployment growth...more