A group of Garrett County property owners announced this week they have formed an organization to provide public information about concerns related to natural gas drilling. The group, called CitizenShale.org, will hold two high-profile education events next week.

The organization's executive committee is currently taking shape, and anyone wanting an active role is encouraged to get involved. "People in Garrett County - landowners, renters, businesses - need to be informed," said Eric Robison, CSO's Director of  Educational Outreach. "CitizenShale hopes to play an active role in that education and seeks members of the community to help us develop a broad consensus for involvement."

Robison, a candidate for Garrett County Commission last fall who campaigned for enhanced local control of industrial "Marcellus shale" drilling, said the local citizens who formed CitizenShale have been involved in the public debate about industrial drilling since a Texas corporation, Chief Oil & Gas, announced it wanted to drill four wells in the county last November. "Large Corporations from outside Garrett County and Maryland do not have our community's best interest at heart," said Robison. "With that in mind, several residents have questioned state and county officials to see what should be done. We found a void that needed to be addressed."

Chief announced in May that it had sold all of its leased holdings in Garrett County, amounting to several thousand acres, to California- based Chevron. Although the purchase price has not been disclosed, national media reports have put the price at about $10,000 per acre, on 288,000 total acres in three states, including the Maryland holdings.

A survey of Chief's leases in Garrett County shows a typical price paid for shale gas leases first bought in 2006 and 2007 was $5 to $7 per acre. Some of those five-year leases began expiring earlier this year. All told, roughly 110,000 acres in Garrett County, plus several thousand in Allegany County, are leased. More than a dozen companies, all from outside Maryland, own the leases.

The way leasing agents and the energy companies develop areas to drill will be the subject of two public presentations next week at Garrett College's auditorium in McHenry. CitizenShale is organizing both.

On Monday, July 11 at 7 p.m., the Emmy Award-winning documentary "Split Estate" will be shown. The film explores consequences for landowners who do not own their mineral rights but whose property is developed for shale gas. There is no admission charge.

Two nights later, on July 13, also at 7 p.m., CitizenShale will sponsor an evening informational session on gas leasing and the Dormant Mineral Interests Act. Representatives from the Maryland Office of the Attorney General, along with local attorneys assembled by the Garrett County Bar Association's pro bono committee, will try to help residents better understand their rights and preferred objectives when signing a gas lease.

Assistant attorneys general will also provide an overview of the dormant mineral law. It sets a Sept. 30 deadline this year for all state residents to file claims to mineral rights that may been severed in past property transactions.

Shale gas drilling was put on hold until at least August 2014 after Gov. Martin O'Malley earlier this month announced an executive order requiring more study of the issues, including any liability industry should assume if damages occur. Before drilling is allowed in Maryland, O'Malley said, the state must fully understand the environmental consequences of the drilling underway in nearby states; some 2,500 gas wells have been "fracked" in Pennsylvania since 2005, with hundreds more in West Virginia.

CitizenShale may be contacted at citizenshale.org, or by writing the organization at P.O. Box 355, Oakland, MD 21550.