Earlier this month, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued another opinion in the long-running PEDF litigation about the public trust provisions of the Environmental Rights Amendment to the Pennsylvania Constitution. See Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation v. Commonwealth, No. 65 MAP 2020 (Pa. Aug. 5, 2022)(PEDF VI). PEDF challenged several years’ appropriation of proceeds from oil and gas leasing under state forest and park land. There is a lot of money at stake. But are the issues posed here really the sorts of things that the courts have to resolve in order to help businesses, governments, and courts figure out what Article I, Section 27, of the Pennsylvania Constitution means in practice?

In this iteration of PEDF, the court held that proceeds of oil and gas leases could be allocated to the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources even though some would be used for DCNR’s general operations and some would be used for DCNR purposes outside the Marcellus Shale region. Further the majority held that legislation putting the General Assembly, rather than DCNR, in direct control over the fund was not facially unconstitutional because the statute directed consideration of the Environmental Rights Amendment obligations when appropriating the money. Similarly, commingling of lease proceeds with the Keystone Fund, which might not be impressed with the public trust, did not violate the ERA because an accounting could be kept.