County gets good news on BWCA payments

It took a single phone call to finally answer one of the most important questions facing Cook County in 2019. That question was: How much money would the federal government issue the county under the Thye-Blatnik Act in 2020?

The answer is $2.25 million, the same as it has been for the past decade.

A phone call Dec. 18 from U.S. Congressman Pete Stauber, who represents Minnesota's Eighth Congressional District, to Interim Cook County Administrator Rena Rogers was the first the county heard of the funding scenario.

It now breaks down like this: Cook County, St. Louis County and Lake County will receive the same amount in 2020 and 2021 as they have for the past decade while a new appraisal takes place.

In 1948, United States lawmakers passed the Thye-Blatnik Act to buy resorts and private lands in what would eventually be named the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.

The bill also provides payments in-lieu-of-taxes (PILT) to Cook, Lake and St. Louis counties for federal wilderness land to make up for lost private property taxes. A valuation process is completed every 10 years to determine how much each county receives through this piece of legislation.

The most recent appraisal of the BWCA was done in 2009, when Cook County annual payments increased from just over $704,000 to $2.25 million.

This year, until Dec. 19, St. Louis, Lake and Cook Counties were still awaiting word on the valuation of federal lands inside the BWCA. There was speculation among county assessors, elected officials, county attorneys and other staff that the funding would be reduced by approximately one-third for 2020 from what it was this year. As it stands now, that amount will remain the same.

The Cook County Board of Commissioners set their final levy for 2020 on Dec. 17, just two days before the Thye-Blatnik funding report came in. Having that knowledge before setting the final levy could have led to a reduction from the 5.89 percent it was ultimately set at. Nonetheless, this should provide Cook County a financial cushion for next year as they had been prepared for a smaller amount than the $2.25 million the county will now receive.

WTIP’s Joe Friedrichs spoke with Interim County Administrator Rena Rogers about this news.