Alva Review-Courier -

A special meeting was called by the Woods County Board of Equalization on Thursday, June 22, to discuss a round of fair cash value appeals made to the board by several oil and gas companies in the area. The board's quorum was met, and in attendence were Chris Olson, Robert Seivert, Joe Shirley, Shelley Reed, Renetta Benson, Jeff Mills, Stephanie Lambert and Brian Mitchell. Jerry Wisdom and Benjamin Hunley, representatives from Total Assessment Solutions Corporation (TASC), were also in attendence.

The companies requesting appeals were SandRidge Exploration & Production LLC, Tall Oak Midcon LLC, DCP Midstream LP/DCP Operating Co. LP, and Williams MLP Operating. SandRidge Exploration and Production sent a representative, Jeff Mills from Merit Advisors LLC, to represent them, while Tall Oak Midcon and DCP Midstream sent affidavits in lieu of attending in person. Williams MLP Operating settled their appeal before the meeting.

SandRidge Exploration and Production requested an appeal of several well site fair market values because it believes the value of the appraisals to be “excessive,” as stated on its formal appeal. “It's more of a taxibility issue (than a fair market value issue) with the salt water disposal wells,” Mills said. He went on to say that the laws concerning the taxibility of the wells were created when vertical drilling was more common, instead of the horizontal drilling common today, which produces more water. Mills showed the board data that the company has 197 production wells connected to 15 saltwater disposal wells. Mills stated that according to the laws he mentioned, some of the wells are exempt and some are partly exempt, and the percentage of exemption was what needed to be determined when reviewing the final values.

The board had many questions for Mills, including how the saltwater was tracked and measured, who profits from the wells, and questions pertaining to the fees that “working interest owners” pay.

The board voted, per Wisdom's recommendation, to revisit the appeal in July after SandRidge Exploration and Production produces more data to back up its claim that the fair cash values should be reviewed. Mills agreed to work with Wisdom until then to review data and possibly settle the matter before the next formal meeting is called.

Next, the board reviewed Tall Oak Midcon's appeal. The appeal was dismissed due to several major discrepencies between the written appeal and the information provided with the appeal. The board approved Wisdom's recommendation that Tall Oak Midcon agree and uphold to the original value that the company was sent.

DCP Midstream's fair cash value was corrected from 22,884,530 to a reduced 19,884,530 and approved by the board after some discussion.

Lastly, the board discussed Williams MLP Operating and what it had agreed upon with TASC. The meter locations of the company were updated and its fair cash value was revised. The starting value was $4,944,226 and the new agreed upon value is now $5,081,587.

The Alva Review-Courier and Newsgram are constantly producing videos of meetings such as these to keep the public informed. To watch this video, along with many others, visit the newspapers' website at http://www.alvareviewcourier.com or YouTube channel Lynn L. Martin.