January 21, 2013 07:58 PM UTC

Ray Scott demonstrates profound dishonesty...or ignorance...you choose

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• by: Duke Cox

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

Representative Ray Scott of Mesa CountyВ introduced a bill into the Colorado Legislature on Friday that would exempt oil and gas wells permittedВ in the next two yearsВ from the states’ severance tax.В  В He claims the point is to help fund education, because after the two year free ride, he intendsВ subsequent severance taxes will be earmarked to fund college tuitions. Yeah, …right.

His supposition is that a freebie from the state is necessary and desirable to spur a slug of permits that will then create a resultant uptick in drilling, which will then spur job creation. He claims the idea is much like Amendment 58 which went down in 2008 by nearly 60 % at the ballot box…but it isn’t.

The Bill Ritter supported Amendment 58 would have raised severance taxes on O&G production and would have ended the decades long Ad Valorem Tax Credit that alreadyВ allows O&G companies to reduce their severance taxes in the amount of the property taxes they owe.В  This discount, which they alone enjoy, В amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes they don’t pay…year after year. To offer them another freebie and try to link it to a bill that did just the opposite to the industryВ isВ  plainly dishonest.

But, when you are a legislative toad for the oil and gas industry, you can never be quite dishonest enough…so Rep. Scott deals out this whopper…

 “The oil and gas industry in Colorado is arguably the largest industry in our state,

This , of course, is not true…and I believe Ray Scott knows it. В O&G are part of the energy and mining sector of our state economy…a sector which makes up under 5% of our state economic output. He is either lying or ignorant.

he also offers up another gem…

“Each derrick’s going to create potentially 200 jobs. If we could get one extra derrick in Mesa County right now, that 200 jobs is important. If we got five, that’s a thousand jobs.”

I am not sure what sort of math the good Representative is using to calculate this (or where he gets his data), but it is the same sort of calculation, I will bet, that allows the “blonde lady in the black pantsuit” to claim O&G supports 11,000,000 jobs nationally. I have checked withВ  the U.S. Dept. of Labor and I can only say to her, “liar, liar, pantsuit on fire” because she isn’t telling the truth…

and neither is Ray Scott.