The House of Representatives is calling for a “full overhaul” of the federal program that provides money to local communities near large Energy Department sites that cannot be taxed.
Given that localities cannot tax property owned by the U.S. government, Payments in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) programs have served as a means to provide federal funding to communities situated around such properties – for DOE, that covers facilities such as the Hanford Site in Washington state and Savannah River Site in South Carolina, both home to large cleanup and radioactive waste management programs.
But House energy appropriators said the PILT program has gotten out of hand over the years. “The formulas used by DOE to determine what payments it will make are not transparent, are not interpreted consistently across all sites, and no longer appear to be consistent with the intent of Congress,” according to the House report on its Energy and Water Development Appropriations bill. The report indicates that DOE last visited the issue of PILT guidance in 2003.
Citing a Government Accountability Office study from the 1990s, the House Appropriations Committee said payments to localities can be as little as $1,000 or as much as $6 million, and it’s hard to decipher what criteria DOE is using to justify the amounts.
“After reasonable notice has been given in the Federal Register,” the House wants DOE “to terminate” all existing PILT agreements and enter into new ones using consistent, transparent criteria.
The full House earlier this month approved the legislation as part of a government-wide funding program for the budget year beginning Oct. 1. The Senate has not yet taken action on the measure.
