Western Senators Introduce Measure To Offer Certainty For Cabin Owners

Leading U.S. Senators from the American West introduced a bipartisan measure to make cabin user fees more affordable and predictable, allowing families to keep their cabins on Forest Service land at no cost to the federal government. Many Western families have owned family cabins on leased Forest Service land for generations. But due to skyrocketing land values, annual user fees are too expensive for many families, forcing some to consider abandoning their cabins. Led by Senator Jon Tester (D-Montana), the lawmakers are addressing the issue by restructuring the fee system to reduce annual user fees to as low as $500 and requiring new land appraisals to be completed within two years. The Cabin Fee Act assigns annual user fees according to an eleven-tier “cabin value” system ranging from $500 to $5,500. This system will provide greater certainty to cabin owners, but will not reduce the Forest Service’s revenue from cabin leasing...more