Time is fast running out for the commissioners to correct oversights in Senator Ron Wyden’s forest resources bill relating to the distribution of funds derived from the CBWR grant lands. This week, wyden announced the bill will reach the full Senate early in February and while the commissioners stated they will deliver a letter addressing concerns with the bill and in particular lumping CBWR in with the O&C counties thereby depriving Coos County of significant revenue, no letter has yet been approved.
At this week’s BOC meeting, Don Gurney addressed the commission to offer some recommendations to move the letter along. Board chairman, Melissa Cribbins was tasked with drafting the letter explained that she was “halfway done” and punctuated the remark by holding by displaying a three inch gap between her thumb and forefinger. During citizen comments, Gurney read into the record the recommendations below with the hopes of expediting the letter to Wyden’s office.
In order to retain the agreement designated within the Coos Bay Wagon Road Reconveyance Act of 1919 and the 1939 CBWR Distribution of Funds Act clarifying and designating the payment of funds to Coos and Douglas counties proportionately we ask that you apply the payment formula set forth in Title II, Subsection (d) of the proposed forest bill in keeping with these Acts.
Title II Subsection (d) states “All amounts received for the applicable fiscal year by the Secretary from the covered land during a fiscal year that is in excess of the amount necessary to carry out subsections (b) and (c) shall be provided to the counties that contain covered land … in the form of annual payments” equivalent to 75% of the actual revenue derived from within each of the two counties.
An accounting of the Coos Bay Wagon Road Fund established with the passage of the Act of 1919 should be examined from the decade beginning 2010 and 75% of the balance less any SRS payments be immediately distributed to Coos and Douglas counties proportionately.
Earlier, another citizen, Dick Mork, criticized Cribbins for not moving aggressively on matters related to CBWR. The commissioner noticeably stiffened and bristled at the comment while declaring this is really a “federal issue”. An exchange ensued that hearkens back to the matter of the commission taking action on the NDAA with Mork pointing out that amongst their duties as elected officials is to represent the public interests to state and federal officials.
Patience please. The lady is squeezing commissioner work in with vodka making and CB water works tasks. Cribbins has been tasked with writing a letter regarding a subject of which she has no knowledge. She should have asked an expert to write the letter – if not Gurney someone else. And, by delaying, by not writing, by Wyden’s bill passing, doesn’t the tribe gain some benefit in their desire to help themselves to the taxpayers – of which they are not – Wagon Road forest monies?
Well, in this instance inaction will benefit no one, not the tribe nor anyone else in Coos County. It will only serve to fatten, ever so slightly, the overall O&C kitty while depriving Coos County of revenue from a long standing federal agreement.