MIDDLESEX TWP — Butler County Judge Michael Yeager has dismissed the appeal from a group of residents and two environmental groups to a ruling by the Middlesex Township Zoning Hearing Board that upholds a zoning amendment on shale gas operations in the township.

The dismissal also lifts a court-mandated stay on the development of five gas wells on the Bob and Kim Geyer property on Denny Road.

“We are pleased with the outcome of this process and look forward to recommencing operations at the well site in the near future,” said Rex Energy spokesman Pat Creighton.

The residents, plus the Delaware Riverkeeper Network and the Clean Air Council, appealed to the zoning board the township supervisors’ August 2014 vote to approve the zoning amendment, which would allow shale natural gas operations in much of the township.

After months of testimony by witnesses for the residents and environmental groups on one side and witnesses for Rex Energy, Mark West Energy Partners, and Middlesex Township on the other, the zoning board voted in May to uphold the amendment approved by the supervisors.

The residents and environmental groups then appealed the zoning board’s decision to county court, and Judge Yeager made his ruling Thursday.

In his ruling, Yeager lists and refutes each of the claims of the appealers before dismissing their case entirely and affirming the zoning board’s decision to uphold the amendment.