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The governor has clearly chosen the natural gas industry as a vehicle to fulfill campaign promises.An &#8220;accomplished&#8221; businessman such as Gov. Tom Wolf should be easily able to recognize the foolishness of implementing an additional tax on an industry that has done so much for his state.I am very proud of what the industry has allowed my family to achieve, but we are worried it could all come swiftly to an end because of the governor&#8217;s severance tax proposal. My family started Sugar Hollow Water Services L.L.C. to provide water, trucking and erosion and sedimentation control services to the natural gas industry. At our peak, we employed 35 people from Wyoming County and the surrounding area.But, the current commodity pricing of natural gas is forcing the natural gas industry to scale back development, and capital that fuels small businesses such as ours is drying up.We understand this industry is cyclical and we have responded to this downturn by cutting back our labor force. Though challenging, we are doing what we must to survive.The most serious threat to the natural gas industry and our business is the governor&#8217;s severance tax on top of already depressed prices. A severance tax on the surface might look to only affect the &#8220;big oil and natural gas companies,&#8221; but in reality it has a direct negative effect on businesses like ours. As far as we are concerned, any tax on the natural gas industry is a tax on us.Bill HamptonTunkhannock

Letter to the Editor: Natural gas severance tax would be setback to Tunkhannock-area small business