Authorizing Early Repayment of Obligations to Bureau of Reclamation Within Northport Irrigation District

Floor Speech

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Mr. SMITH of Nebraska. Mr. Speaker, under Federal reclamation law, irrigation districts that receive water from a Bureau of Reclamation facility typically repay their portion of the capital costs of water projects under long-term contracts.

Under its current contract and current law, Northport Irrigation District is exempt from annual capital repayment if their carriage fee exceeds $8,000 per year. Given the carriage fee has greatly exceeded this amount every year since the 1950s, Northport's capital repayment debt has been stagnant at more than $923,000 since 1952. So long as the debt endures, landowners are subject to burdensome reporting requirements and acreage limitations, and no revenue is generated for the Federal Government.

I introduced this bill to provide members of the Northport Irrigation District early repayment authority under their dated reclamation contract. Allowing producers within the Northport Irrigation District to pay off their portion of the contract means the government will receive funds otherwise uncollected and landowners will be relieved of costly constraints that threaten family-owned operations.

For example, at a previous Water, Power and Oceans Subcommittee hearing, a member of the Northport district testified that acreage limitations will prohibit parents who own land in the district from passing down or selling farmland to sons and daughters who also own land in the same district.

Similar legislation has previously passed under bipartisan majorities and, according to past CBO projections, could generate as much as $440,000 in Federal revenue.

This is a very simple bill that would make a big difference to some family farmers in Nebraska.

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