PITTSBURGH -- Allegheny County property owners are now receiving an invitation that, until recently, only went to folks in rural areas of Western Pennsylvania.

Homeowners in Jefferson Hills, Kennedy Township and Monroeville have been getting letters from natural gas drilling companies with offers to lease their mineral rights and a mention of royalty income.

But before you get blinded by dollar signs, Team 4 investigative reporter Jim Parsons has a report you don't want to miss.

What follows is a transcript of Parsons' report:

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We're not talking here about the shallow natural gas wells that have been drilled for years in places like Penn Hills and Plum. The companies now approaching property owners in Allegheny County are in the business of going after the mother lode: the huge reserve of gas that's trapped in the Marcellus shale formation, located a mile and a half beneath us. There's no question these companies and some landowners are making money. But at what price?

Matt Pitzarella, Range Resources, LLC: "Hopefully what we want to do is give an update on how we're doing things, and thanking everyone for their patience and being good partners."

In municipalities across western Pennsylvania, natural gas drilling companies are holding town hall meetings, part of a public relations campaign to win the hearts, minds and signatures of property owners.

Matt Pitzarella, Range Resources, LLC: "There are pros and cons to everything. And we'd like to believe that the community is going to be left in a better place than before we got here."

What the energy companies have to offer are royalty payments and jobs. And lots of both.

Walter Bunt, Energy Industry Attorney: "The considerable opportunities offered by the Marcellus Shale both for Pennsylvania and its citizens are quite significant."

How significant? One Washington County farmer told the British news organization Reuters that he has already received over half a million dollars in royalties from the recent drilling of natural gas on his property. But not everyone is so lucky.

Steph Hallowich, Washington County: "I would give the money back if they pulled all this out and leave tomorrow. It's not worth it to me and by the time we get it and pay taxes on it, it's not worth it."

Steph Hallowich of Hickory, Washington County says her gas well royalties total $15,000 in the last two years. She has a list of worries about the wells on and near her property.

The 40-foot flames that shoot out of the rig when the wells are being drilled, and the noise, and the football-field size reservoir dug behind her house, and the hundreds of trucks that go past her house every day.

Steph Hallowich, Washington County: "There is constant traffic. It's a safety issue for my son when he gets on the bus, because there have been several trucks that haven't been able to stop when the red lights are flashing. They're too heavy and they're going way too fast."

Steph has a word of advice for property owners in Allegheny County.

Steph Hallowich, Washington County: "Do everything they can to see if their township has ordinances to stop something like this."

But every township that has tried to regulate drilling, most recently, Salem Township in Westmoreland County, has been met with defeat in the courts.

Walter Bunt, Drilling Industry Attorney: "The DEP is the agency responsible for permitting and monitoring oil and gas operations. And the township doesn't have the authority to do that."

But that doesn't stop them from trying. Blaine Township, Washington County is facing a federal lawsuit by a gas drilling company for passing ordinances that attempt to regulate drillers.

Ben Price, Attorney: "We need to begin in the communities where we live to assert our rights to make the decisions."

Ben Price of the national organization Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, offered Blaine Township's supervisors free legal representation to fight the drilling company's lawsuit.

Scott Weiss, Blaine Supervisor: "Corporations do get put ahead of people because it's commerce. And that is what this whole thing is about, making money."

But in tough economic times, an offer of easy money can be difficult to turn down.

Lisa Marcucci, Jefferson Hills Homeowner: "I was approached. I said no. I looked at the facts and figures and said no."

Like her neighbors in Jefferson Hills, Lisa Marcucci recently got an offer from a Canonsburg company offering to lease her mineral rights. But Lisa, who is an environmental activist, didn't see dollar signs. She saw visions of flames and heavy truck traffic. And she remembered a Marcellus Shale gas well that exploded in eastern Pennsylvania last year.

Lisa Marcucci, Jefferson Hills Homeowner: "The more I see, the more alarmed I grow. It alarms me that we are, as a state, looking at economic development isolated, instead of looking at what are the implications. Especially when we move this thing into residential areas."

There is one thing local government can do to control gas drilling. In a recent case involving Oakmont, the state supreme court ruled that municipalities can use their zoning laws to forbid gas wells in R-1 residential areas.

There's an informational meeting for property owners tonight on Marcellus shale gas drilling. It starts at 7 p.m. at the Elrama fire hall in Elizabeth. For more information visit www.pahouse.com/PR/039052109.asp.

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