Brief Description: Concerning the verification of a landowner as a small forest landowner.

Sponsors: Representative Orcutt.

Hearing Date:

Staff: Jason Callahan (786-7117).

Background:

The forest riparian easement (FRE) program is a program managed by the Department of Natural Resources's (DNR) Small Forest Landowner Office to acquire fifty-year easements along riparian and other sensitive aquatic areas from small forest landowners that are willing to sell or donate easements to the state [RCW 76.13.120(1)]. The DNR is authorized to purchase easements from small forest landowners and hold the easements in the name of the state [RCW 76.13.120(3)]. The easements are restrictive only, and do not restrict the landowner's activities except as necessary to protect the riparian functions of the habitat for the term of the easement [RCW 76.13.120(5)].

The FRE program is only available to small forest landowners who file a forest practices application with the DNR. Generally compensation is offered for the trees that the landowner is unable to harvest due to the riparian restrictions in the forest practices rules. To qualify as a "small forest landowner," a landowner, among other things, generally may not have harvested more than two million board feet of timber in the three years prior to filing a FRE program application [RCW 76.13.120(2) & RCW 84.33.035(14)]. Information relating to harvest levels are reported to, and maintained by, the Department of Revenue for the purposes of calculating the landowner's timber excise tax (Chapter 84.33 RCW).

Landowners wishing to participate in the FRE program must file an application with the Small Forest Landowners Office. That application requires certain information, including a certification by the landowner that he or she meets the harvest threshold required of small forest landowners, the tax identification number of the landowner, and permission for the DNR to access harvest information on file with the Department of Revenue [WAC 222-21-030(2)].

Summary of Bill:

The DNR is prohibited from reviewing the timber harvest records of a FRE program applicant, or any other tax-related information on file with the Department of Revenue, when establishing whether the applicant satisfies the criteria for small forest landowner status.

Upon request from the DNR, the Department of Revenue must confirm or deny, based on submitted tax documents, that a FRE program applicant has not exceeded the three-year harvest limit required to be considered a small forest landowner. The Department of Revenue is prohibited from disclosing more information than whether or not the qualifying thresholds have been met.

Appropriation: None.

Fiscal Note: Not requested.

Effective Date: The bill takes effect 90 days after adjournment of session in which bill is passed.