Revenue Sharing: Advocacy Update

by | May 18, 2020 | Advocacy

On January 22, 2019, RWR Friends President Ann Graziano along with Friends member Joe McCauley and two members of the Richmond County Board of Supervisors, Chairman Lee Sanders and Robert Pemberton, met with Congressman Rob Wittman,1st District of Virginia, to work on a plan to get the Revenue Sharing program fully funded.

Revenue Sharing was designed to help reimburse localities for the loss of tax revenue when county property becomes owned by the U.S. government; the federal government does not pay local property taxes.  If there is a lot of federal property in a county, the locality is severely impacted with a loss of tax monies.  This is the case in Richmond County where nearly 6,000 acres are part of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Refuge system.

Over the years Congress has failed to fully fund this program.  The amount paid to the counties has decreased over the years.  Now Richmond County suffers a shortfall of nearly $65,000 per year in lost tax dollars.

At the meeting the group and Wittman agreed on a plan to fully fund Revenue Sharing using monies from the Land and Water Conservation Fund, while not depleting the funds that LWCF uses for land acquisition.  Both the RWR Friends Group and the county will write letters outlining the specifics in support of this solution.

The Friends have written their letter and sent it to the Richmond County Board of Supervisors who will draft a similar letter.  Both letters will be sent to Congressman Wittman.  He will take these letters to the appropriations committee for implementation and to the House floor should the appropriations not be passed in committee.

It was agreed that both the county and the RWR Friends would continue to follow-up with Mr. Wittman on this very important issue.

If you are interested in helping, you can access Congressman Wittman’s email at: https://wittman.house.gov/contact/ and write that you support having the appropriations committee fully fund the Refuge Revenue Sharing Act or you can call him at: (202) 225-4261.

Contributed by Ann Graziano