You, the taxpayer, are paying the price, whether you live in the city or the country.

The following information is directly from Dave Cook, the Yakima County, Wash., assessor.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife owns 84,772 acres in Yakima County and is proposing to buy two other parcels. The taxes when it purchases the land are reduced immediately to 50% of the value of open space.

The tax amount is $453,000 per year. However, the state is paying only $125,000 per year, and it owes Yakima County $1.5 million in back taxes. 

Across Washington, the Department of Fish and Wildlife should have paid $7.5 million instead of the $2 million it did pay. If the Payment in Lieu of Taxes was fully funded it would amount to over $5 million.

Several counties are now saying the department should not purchase any more land in that county.

To add insult to injury, we are talking about a farm or ranch that was sustaining an owner who was making a living and paying taxes before the department purchased it, and there must have been wildlife and habitat, or else why would it buy it?

After the department purchase, the taxes are half what they were and the land is then managed from a pick-up and it becomes a welfare farm as it no longer produces revenue, so you the taxpayer, are paying for it.

Our legislators have created this problem, which I have been pursuing over 20 years, and no one is interested.

Our legislators should fix the problem they created!

Don Young

85-year-old

retired cattleman

Sunnyside, Wash.