The U.S. Government Accountability Office said Tuesday the Department of Energy should provide better documentation of how it manages the payments in lieu of taxes (PILT) program for communities around nuclear facilities.
The Energy Department handed out $23 million in PILT revenue to communities near a dozen nuclear laboratory and cleanup sites in fiscal 2017. Of that, 70% went to communities around the Hanford Site in Washington state and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Payments to localities in eight other states combined amounted to only 5% of the total, according to a GAO report.
Over 2 million acres of land are held by the federal government for nuclear weapons development, environmental remediation, and energy research. Those holdings are not subject to local property taxes that would otherwise fund roads, schools, and other programs. The Atomic Energy Act authorizes discretionary payments to qualifying host communities to help offset lost property tax revenue.
The PILT program grew from roughly $9.5 million in 1994 to $23 million in 2017. The GAO said the Energy Department lacks clear criteria to determine how the payments are divided between recipient communities.
As a result, the congressional watchdog recommended DOE’s chief financial officer maintain documentation used in decision-making, review community PILT invoices for accuracy, and draft guidance on how communities should calculate payment requests.
A report that accompanied the Department of Energy’s 2018 budget bill directed the GAO to review Energy Department PILT policy. The inquiry was sought by Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho).
The Energy Department said communities near most of its nuclear sites do not receive PILT money because they are ineligible or have not applied. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico is an example of an ineligible site because the property near Carlsbad was already federal land.
The Energy Department has set up a working group to study implementing the GAO recommendations and report to agency leadership by the end of March.
