New Timber Taxes Proposed, Industry Says They Can’t Afford Them
March 10, 2021
In 1991, the Oregon state legislature passed a measure reducing what was known as the “severance tax,” which collected revenue from logging companies for trees cut on privately owned land. This was intended to reduce the hardship which companies said they were suffering from the reduction in the amount of logging they were able to do on land owned by the state and federal governments as a result of measures taken to protect wildlife. Timber companies warned that if they were not given this tax relief, they were in danger of bankruptcy.