Mineral County facing possible funding cuts

Residents could see tax hike

By KATHLEEN WOODFORD

Mineral Independent

After a summer of struggle to balance the books, Mineral County Commissioners were dealt another blow regarding the county’s shrinking budget. The SRS or Secure Rural Schools, and PILT-Payment in Lieu of Taxes grants, may be cut by the government before the next fiscal year begins.

There are approximately $1.2 million at stake with a third slated for local schools and two-thirds for road maintenance. That’s $450,000 split between Superior, St. Regis, and Alberton Schools. At last Friday’s commissioners meeting the school’s superintendents, Scott Kinney from Superior, Joe Steele from St. Regis, and Clay Acker from Alberton, addressed the commissioners. They said those funds were primarily used for transportation, to keep the buses in good working order as well as for fuel, and for retirement funds.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., and Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., were invited to attend the meeting to discuss this issue, but both were unable to attend. Commissioner Roman Zylawy read a letter from Daines which stated, “unfortunately, the Secure Rural Schools Program was not reauthorized in the Continuing Resolution passed at the end of the 114th Congress. However, please know that I will continue to fight for this very important program as we move into the next congress, in hopes that we can reauthorize SRS and get our rural counties the money they need.”

Tax payers may be called on to make up the difference, but with a county population just over 4,000, it would mean a steep increase for families. Mineral is one of the poorest counties in Montana and the commissioners agreed that if they raise taxes too high, then people will start moving out of the area.

Montana receives about $21 million in SRS grant funds which are distributed primarily to forested counties. These funds stems from a 1905 bill called the ‘Twenty-Five Percent Fund Act’, passed by President Teddy Roosevelt that guaranteed 25 percent of timber industry funds would stay in their respective counties.

By 2000, timber sales had dropped so much that SRS was adopted to make up the difference. It was based on the average of the three highest years of 25-percent payments from 1986 to 1999.

The original act expired after five years. It received an emergency appropriation in 2007 and was reauthorized with some changes for four years in 2008. Congress renewed SRS in 2012 and 2013, then didn’t in 2014. It was reauthorized in 2015 and is now slated to end in July, 2017. This will affect next year’s budgets.

“SRS is sometimes called ‘Western welfare’, and we don’t like welfare money,” said Zylawy, “but what do we do if we aren’t able to log? It’s what we used to rely on.”

In his letter, Daines remarked that the issue with SRS and PILT funds would not be complete without addressing the long-term solution to many of these issues which includes comprehensive forest management reform.

“Montana’s forests and wood products industry were recently dealt a blow this October when the Supreme Court denied the appeal of the Forest Service in challenging the disastrous ‘Cottonwood Environmental Law Center vs. Forest Service’ ruling out of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. This ruling requires federal agencies to consult with the Fish and Wildlife Service at a programmatic level when new critical habitat is designated or a new species is listed. As the Forest Service would need to halt worthwhile forest management projects that enhance wildlife habitat and bring jobs to our mills, this decision will be devastating. According to the Obama Administration, this decision has the potential to cripple land management.”

It was agreed during the meeting that the ultimate goal is forest reform.

“It’s a travesty that we have to beg every year for funds,” stated Commissioner, Duane Simons.

One suggestion made by county extension agent, Kevin Chamberlain, would be to bill the government for what the land is actually worth, “currently, we bill for pennies on the dollar,” he said.

For example, Plum Creek was taxed $1.80 per acre on average, where the Forest Service is currently paying 13 cents an acre. Only eight percent of the Mineral County is privately owned, the rest is public land. Chamberlain suggested that the government should step-up and pay for its fair share of the management of public lands. He said they may not pay the bill, but at least it would get their attention.

Simons also suggested sending some delegates to Washington, D.C. to talk to representatives in person.

“States in the east don’t understand what’s happening in the west,” said Zylawy, “they don’t understand the impact the loss of these funds have on counties like ours.”

SRS and PILT money were designed to off-set revenue that the county used to earn on its own off the forest, Zylawy explained in an interview earlier this year, “but since they’ve moved away from timber management to recreation, they have replaced that money in the form of welfare to hundreds of counties across the west. If the forest service ends the SRS and PILT payments, then they better start letting us cut timber again. They can’t have it both ways.”