House Bill 1202 would allow funding for counties with 19% state-, federal-owned property; 35% of Brown County land affected

0

The Indiana General Assembly is now in session and a new bill has been introduced that could make a difference to local first responders.

The bill — House Bill 1202 — will allow Indiana counties that have more than 19% of state- and federal-owned properties in their area to receive payment in lieu of property tax, to be allocated for emergency services including fire, law enforcement and EMS.

The payment, which would come from the state’s general fund, would be used for new equipment and/or the replacement of equipment due to wear and tear.

According to the Indiana General Assembly, the bill requires the state to make payments in lieu of property taxes — or PILOTs — for qualified parcels in counties in which at least 19% of all land in the county is in the aggregate, owned or leased by the state or the federal government and is subject to an exemption from property taxes.

The bill also provides that a county containing qualified parcels is entitled to receive PILOTs from the state. For purposes of calculating a PILOT, each acre of the qualified parcel is considered to have an assessed value of half of the statewide agricultural land base rate value.

Indiana is comprised of 23.1 million acres of land, with 424,901 — or 1.8% — of those acres being owned by the state, and 510,000 acres — or 2.2% — owned by the federal government.

House Bill 1202 was introduced by Dist. 62 Rep. Dave Hall (R) and Dist. 74 Rep. Stephen Bartels (R).

All of Brown County is included in Hall’s district, as well as portions of Monroe and Jackson counties in south central Indiana.

Dist. 74 includes all of Crawford, Perry and Spencer counties, and portions of Dubois and Orange counties in southern Indiana.

State- and federal-owned land in Brown County adds up to about 35% of all land in the county.

Bartels’ district includes Patoka Lake, which covers 26,000 acres in Crawford County.

“As far as percentage of the entire state, it’s a small (fraction). But the very small fraction (of government-owned land) lands in a few counties, so it’s a huge fraction,” Hall said.

Hall said last week that Bartles has brought up the bill in the past and when it was brought up again this year, Hall knew it would apply to his own district.

He said when he started campaigning last year, the high percentage of state-owned land and the lack of taxes paid on that land was one of the most repeated issues of Brown County residents.

“Everyone loves the (Brown County State Park), but it does create that burden that 15,000 people in Brown County are funding emergency services for visitors,” Hall said.

“When you add 50,000 (visitors) to that equation, that puts a strain on them. … (There is) no development happening on that ground. It takes away property taxes and takes away (emergency services) when you have (emergency) calls in the Brown County State Park.”

Hall said the total amount received for the five counties with more than 19% of state-owned land would be $1.5 to $2 million from the state’s general fund.

Hall said the bill was brought forth in a hearing last month and may not be brought up again this year.

“I’m not giving up, that’s one of my top priorities, to fund public safety,” Hall said.

“I’m hopeful we can see something this session. We’ll do what need to.”

‘It’s overdue’

On Jan. 18, representatives from the Brown County Sheriff’s Office, Brown County Emergency Management and the Brown County Volunteer Fire Department attended a meeting at the Indiana Statehouse to hear discussion and testimony regarding the bill.

Susan Armstrong, Brown County’s emergency management director, said last week that the five counties that the bill would affect were all represented at the statehouse that day.

“We were really packed into the room,” she said.

“It was really good to see that many people there to support the bill. It’s a very important for us here in Brown County.”

Armstrong said the bill is important for Brown County in particular because it’s a small county with a limited tax base. She said the PILOTs are going to benefit all of public safety in Brown County.

“If we were just responsible for protecting the residents of Brown County, (taxes) would probably give us the resources that we need, but because of the state park, we see 1.2 to 1.5 million visitors (each year), so it really does tax our resources here.” she said.

“And that’s what my job really is, is to help find the resources that our responders need to keep the community safe, and it’s a real struggle with the budget constraints that we have.”

Brown County Sheriff Brad Stogsdill said last week that from Jan. 1, 2020 to Jan. 17 of this year, the sheriff’s department had answered 483 calls for service within the boundaries of the Brown County State Park or other state-owned properties within Brown County.

Stogsdill said Indiana Department of Natural Resources has three officers assigned to Brown County, but if they’re not working, the Brown County Sheriff’s Department has to take the calls for service in their jurisdiction instead.

“A lot of times on busy weekends, like the holiday weekends, the ‘big three’ — Memorial Day, The Fourth of July and Labor Day weekend — a lot of the conservation officers get assigned to work Lake Monroe because of the volume of people that go to the lake,” he said.

“So we get left to provide services to the park, that is filled up.”

He said the main park campground, Abe Martin Lodge, the cabins and the horseman’s campground are sometimes all at full capacity. The sheriff’s department ends up taking the majority of the calls that come into the park.

“We get a lot of lost hikers … we have to go in and assist finding injured mountain bikers that have crashed, we have had domestic calls, we’ve had public intoxication calls, loud noise complaints, car wrecks, overdoses in the park — we’ve had a number of things that have happened over the years,” he said.

“Just like everywhere else, when you put that many people (together), things happen.”

Stogsdill said typically, the sheriff’s department has two or three officers on shift at one time, so if officers are being sent into the park for tourism, they’re being taken away from the county population which they are paid to protect and serve.

“The park is solely contained within Brown County, so we have to deal with that volume of people, even though our emergency services are set up for our population of 15,500 people,” he said.

“So at any given time, our population can quadruple or more, on especially busy weekends in October. We’re just not set up for that volume of people.”

Stogsdill said the amount of tax base that the state public lands takes from the sheriff’s department’s funding is “detrimental” to the local agency and to the county in general.

“We’re losing a lot of taxable land and we don’t get anything refunded from the state from that,” he said.

“So that’s where the issue lies — we’re having to provide services to the state and public lands that we don’t get anything for.”

House Bill 1202 is written to help provide equipment for service, not salary or personnel and Stogsdill said each agency in Brown County could use the money.

Specifically, the fire departments could get updated equipment, the sheriff’s department could use a four wheeler, which is smaller and easier to navigate on trails to help for search and rescue. He also mentioned having another drone for a trained officer to use during search and rescue would be beneficial.

“I believe it is overdue,” Stogsdill said.

“I’ve been on the sheriff’s department for over 33 years now, and constantly we have been told that we can’t give the raises and things we need to retain help people for years because of our low tax base, so we’ve always had lower salaries, we’ve always had a large number of turnover, due to that fact.

“We do love our park, it’s something that’s very important to us and that’s kind of what makes Brown County, ‘Brown County.’ We’re going to continue to take calls for service and everything, we would just like for the state to help us out a little bit.”

Learn more

Learn more about House Bill 1202 by visiting iga.in.gov/legislative/2023/bills/house/1202.

Write a letter

Rep. Dave Hall welcomed the public to mail or email letters in support of House Bill 1202.

Letters can be mailed to Indiana House of Representatives, 200 W. Washington St., Indianapolis, IN 46204.

Submit a request for email information at indianahouserepublicans.com/forms/contact-your-representative/.

Previous article Sharon Lee Young (Howery)
Next article Man charged with child exploitation, voyeurism
Abigail is a Brown County native dedicated to the community in which she has been raised. She joined the Brown County Democrat newsroom in 2019 while studying English at IUPUC, where she graduated in May 2020. After working as the news advertising coordinator for nearly two years, she became reporter in September of 2021. She took over as editor in the fall of 2022.

No posts to display