U.S. Senator Steve Daines today announced $34 million in Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) funds to Montana’s rural counties. This year Ravalli County, which includes1,120,319 acres of federally owned national forest land, is slated to receive $2,537,051.
Under the Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) Program, Montana rural communities will receive $34 million to support essential services such as firefighters, police, schools and road construction.
U.S. Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt announced in late June that more than 1,900 local governments around the country will receive $514.7 million in Payments in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) funding for 2019. Montana’s share of the PILT monies came to $34 million.
PILT payments help local governments carry out such vital services as firefighting and police protection, construction of public schools and roads, and search-and-rescue operations. The payments are made annually for tax-exempt Federal lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (all bureaus of the Department of the Interior [DOI]), and the U.S. Forest Service (part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture) and for Federal water projects and some military installations.
“This is good news for our rural communities in Montana,” Daines said. “These payments ensure critical services are delivered so all Montanans, including those in our rural communities, receive the quality of life they deserve.”
Individual county payments may vary from year to year as a result of changes in acreage data, which is updated annually by the federal agency administering the land; prior-year Federal revenue sharing payments reported annually by the Governor of each State; and population data, which is updated using information from the U.S. Census Bureau.