A8
State
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, September 21, 2016
Report shows Malheur
County rich with
gold mine potential
ODFW funding task force to
recommend bottle, income tax
By Claire Withycombe
By Amanda Peacher
Capital Bureau
Oregon Public Broadcasting
A task force convened to suggest new
sustainable funding sources for the Ore-
gon Department of Fish and Wildlife has
settled on two recommended options that
each take the form of tax surcharges —
one on income and one on beverage con-
tainers.
The department is operating on a bi-
ennium budget of about $370 million.
A third of that comes from hunting and
ishing licenses, a third from the federal
government, and the rest for various state
funds.
The agency has faced a growing cash
low problem, according to a 2015 audit
by the Oregon Secretary of State’s Of-
ice. The task force identiied an addi-
tional funding need of $79.9 million per
budget biennium, much of which would
go to conservation efforts, according to a
draft of the task force’s report to the Leg-
islature, released this past week.
Task force chair Mark Labhart will
present the surcharge ideas to two com-
mittees during the Legislature’s interim
session next week.
In a vote at its meeting Friday, the
group was split in terms of prioritizing
either of the suggested surcharges.
The suggested bottle tax would be
2.02 percent applied to the cost of a drink
at wholesale on those containers subject
to the state’s bottle bill on Jan. 1.
“This is intended to be applied to the
cost of a beverage, rather than as an ad-
dition to the beverage container redemp-
tion deposit for those containers subject
to the bottle Bill,” the draft report states.
It’s estimated that the bottle tax could
generate $61.5 million in revenue in
A new report from
Oregon’s
Department
of Geology and Miner-
al Industries shows that
an area that conserva-
tionists want to protect
has a rich vein of mining
potential.
Malheur County has
a lot of gold, silver and
uranium, says DOGAMI
spokeswoman Ali Ryan
Hansen.
“There’s enough of it
that it might be economi-
cally feasible to develop a
mining operation there,”
said Hansen.
But Malheur County
is also the home to the
Owyhee
Canyonlands,
which
conservation-
ists want to see protect-
ed, in part, from new
mining.
The minerals report
from the state comes two
months after Democratic
senators Jeff Merkley and
Ron Wyden introduced
a bill in Congress that
would block new mines
in the Owyhee.
The Southeastern Ore-
gon Mineral Withdrawal
and Economic Preserva-
tion and Development
Act would also block oil
and gas drilling. The bill
hasn’t moved further than
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife
An Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist releases a
sterile tiger trout into diamond lake to prey on invasive fish. A task
force has recommended two possible sources of additional funding
for the department.
2017-19, as the tax would not take ef-
fect until Jan. 1, 2018, and $82 million in
2019-21, according to estimates prepared
for the task force.
The other suggestion the task force
is making would be a 0.7 percent sur-
charge on individual tax returns, with an
exemption for people who earn less than
$20,000 per year.
The task force decided to leave open
for discussion how to retain a “base” of
Oregonians who pay fees to hunt and
ish; suggestions have so far included
tax credits or exemptions for people who
have hunting or ishing licenses.
The income tax surcharge could gen-
erate $60 million in the 2017-19 bien-
nium and $92.9 million in the 2019-21
biennium, according to estimates that were
prepared for the task force. Those estimates
take into account the possible exemptions
for people earning less than $20,000 and
people with ish and wildlife licenses.
Jim Martin, a task force member and
former ODFW employee, who now di-
rects the Berkeley Conservation Institute
at Pure Fishing, said Friday that the taxes
would be “politically dificult,” but the
task force had to communicate the idea
that failing to ix the agency’s “broken”
funding model could undermine “Ore-
gon’s livability and future economy.”
In order for either suggestion to take
hold, lawmakers would have to pass leg-
islation or refer the matter to voters in the
form of a ballot measure.
introduction in the Senate.
Hansen pointed out
that high levels of miner-
al deposits doesn’t mean
that new mines are easily
approved.
“Even though we have
determined that there’s
high potential for gold,
silver (and) other kinds of
resources out there, there
are so many other things
that determine whether a
mine can make a go of it,”
Hansen said.
According to DOG-
AMI, seven significant
mines are permitted in
Malheur County. Most
are industrial or gold
mines.
Conservationists have
lobbied President Obama
to create an Owyhee Na-
tional Monument in Mal-
heur County. Many local
residents oppose that des-
ignation.
The President has
given no indication that
he plans to designate a
monument in Oregon
before the end of his
term.
Grant County also
showed high potential for
precious metals — gold
and silver — and base
metals — copper, lead
and zinc — and chromite.
The Blue Mountain
Eagle contributed to this
report.
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