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Committee advances DNR agency bill changing historic-rehab credits and creating submerged-land preserve language
Summary
House Bill 1616, the Department of Natural Resources agency bill, was advanced. It clarifies notice for severed subsurface mineral interests, adjusts historic rehabilitation tax-credit language and creates a statutory framework for submerged land preserves.
The Tax and Fiscal Policy Committee advanced House Bill 1616, the biennial agency bill for the Department of Natural Resources, by a unanimous committee vote reported as 12–0. Sponsors described the measure as primarily technical and aimed at several discrete topics: notice for severed subsurface mineral interests, a change to historic rehabilitation tax-credit limits and the statutory establishment of submerged-land preserves.
Senator Glick and Representative Glendyar (Glendyar/Glendyar appears in the hearing record; sponsor identified as Representative Glendyar) described three main portions of the bill: a notice requirement when subsurface mineral interests are sold at tax sale (intended to improve outreach to surface owners), an adjustment to the historic rehabilitation tax-credit cap intended to prevent a small number of large projects from exhausting available credits, and a new code section allowing the DNR to create submerged land preserves for shipwrecks and similar sites (the bill references Lake Michigan and the Ohio River and DNR said it has identified 14 such sites and one plane wreck in those waters).
Will Haines, legislative director for DNR, testified in support and said the language was developed in consultation with stakeholders including the oil-and-gas industry and the Indiana Auditors Association. He noted the bill passed the House 97–0 and the Senate Natural Resources Committee unanimously before arriving in this committee.
Representative Glendyar summarized the historic-rehab changes as a cap change intended to broaden access to the credit so that a single large project does not consume available funding. The DNR representative clarified that the submerged-land preserve language would apply to vessels and aircraft in Lake Michigan and the Ohio River and that the agency has a list of identified sites.
Committee members asked questions about the submerged-land preserve process and about how historic value would be determined. Representative Glendyar pointed committee members to statutory language requiring National Register of Historic Places inclusion as an eligibility element for the credit discussion.
The committee voted to advance HB 1616; sponsors said the measure was largely cleanup and agency modernization.
