HARRISBURG - Pennsylvania should levy a 10 percent "drillers tax" to help pay for nearly $1.3 billion in new spending to help support public education initiatives, state Treasurer Rob McCord said Monday.
"The failure to have a drillers tax is ripping off almost all Pennsylvanians to benefit a very few corporate owners," said McCord, a Democratic candidate for governor, appearing before the Pennsylvania Press Club.
McCord in one of five candidates seeking the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in the May 20 primary - former Clinton White House adviser Katie McGinty, U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz, former state Auditor General Jack Wagner and businessman Tom Wolf.
By emphasizing the need for a drillers tax and renewed education investment, McCord combined two issues that have animated Democratic candidates this year as they seek to defeat Republican Gov. Tom Corbett's reelection bid.
McCord said he purposely calls his revenue proposal a driller's tax rather the formal description of severance tax so the public knows where the money would come from.
The treasurer estimated a 10 percent tax on the net value of natural gas after extraction would generate $1.6 billion the first year. He would allow drillers to deduct some production-related expenses.
McCord said he would fully restore cuts to education spending made by Corbett as federal stimulus money ended in 2011 with the new revenue.
He would allocate an additional $220 million for the state Pre-K Counts program to cover 30,000 at-risk 3- and 4-year-old children from low-income families. Corbett enacted a state impact fee on drillers in 2012, and has voiced his opposition to a severance tax. He proposes a new block grant program for school districts in the fiscal 2014-15 budget.