Usfs Refusing Names Of Lessees For County Taxes

Idaho Attorney General Alan Lance wants the federal courts to force the U.S. Forest Service to release information needed by county assessors to levy property taxes.

Lance’s office filed legal arguments Friday in U.S. District Court seeking summary judgment in a lawsuit trying to force the Forest Service to comply with the federal Freedom of Information Act.

The Forest Service has refused to supply the names and addresses of people holding leases and permits to use federal land. Federal officers say to release the information would “constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy” and is barred by the Privacy Act.

This is a new policy. For years, the Forest Service routinely provided the names and addresses to 21 Idaho counties - including all North Idaho counties - so the counties could assess property taxes. Owners of cabins on Forest Service land pay Idaho property taxes on the buildings, although the ground underneath them is public.

Bonner County Assessor Tim Cochran said when the issue was first raised in April that his county has more than 200 private cabins on federal land, most of them on Priest Lake.

Cochran said the Forest Service’s new policy makes little sense. “I think that’s probably silly, and I’d agree with the attorney general.”

The attorney general’s brief, prepared by Deputy Attorney General Matthew McKeown, said the Privacy Act prevents disclosure unless it is required under the Freedom of Information Act.

People who apply for special permits and leases of public lands have no expectation of privacy, the brief said. “The statutes and regulations clearly contemplate a public process. There is no expectation of privacy,” the brief contends.

The Forest Service has been given a multiple use mandate by Congress, and special permits are only one aspect of that multiple use. “The public has a right to know who the Forest Service is doing business with in order to assess the Forest Service’s performance of its statutory duties,” the state argues.

“This goal is made even more important in light of a recent review of the Forest Service by the General Accounting Office that identifies a ‘lack of accountability’ as a fundamental flaw in Forest Service programs.”

“The essence of the Freedom of Information Act is to make the federal government more accountable to the public,” the state said. “The Forest Service’s summary conclusions that disclosing the name and addresses of special use permittees would not shed light on the Forest Service’s functions is … consistent with an agency found to be unaccountable and unresponsive to public input.”